| 词组 | continual, continuous |
| 释义 | continual, continuous As far as we can tell, the first person to draw a distinction between continual and continuous was Elizabeth Jane Whately, in her book A Collection of English Synonyms, published under her father's name in 1851. A 'continuous' action is one which is uninterrupted, and goes on unceasingly as long as it lasts, though that time may be longer or shorter. 'Continual' is that which is constantly renewed and recurring, though it may be interrupted as frequently as it is renewed. Miss Whately's distinction has been repeated with some frequency since; our files hold examples from about 50 handbooks and usage guides published between the turn of the century and 1986. The restatements have generally been briefer; here, for instance, is Prentice Hall 1978: Continual means "frequently repeated" Continuous means "without interruption" You may well wonder why this distinction needs such frequent repeating. Margaret M. Bryant, writing in Word Study (May 1956) seems to have found the reason: • As explicit as all handbooks for writing are, they have not succeeded in establishing a definite difference in continual and continuous in the minds of many. The reasons for this failure are, as we shall see, historical. Continual is the older word, dating from the 14th century. The definition given first in the OED encompasses both the sense Miss Whately prescribes for continuous and the one she prescribes for continual; the latter is marked "less strictly" in the OED. Continuous came along in the 17th century and was first applied to continuity in space. The earliest distinction between the two words may be the one made by Dr. Johnson in his 1755 dictionary: "Continual is used of time, and continuous of place." The meaning of continuous prescribed by Miss Whately did not become established until her own time—from the 1830s on. It is quite possible that Miss Whately was basing her discrimination on what she believed to be the cultivated practice of her time, although she gives us no actual examples nor does she cite any author who makes the distinction. She seems to have been entirely unaware of the earlier use of either word and of the fact that the original sense of continual had not died. When the first example below was written, continuous hardly existed in English: • ... the plot being busy (though I think not intricate) and so requiring a continual attention —Aphra Behn, epistle to the reader, The Dutch Lover, 1673 • What dreadful hot weather we have! It keeps one in a continual state of Inelegance —Jane Austen, letter, 18 Sept. 1796 • ... a continual supply of the most amiable and innocent enjoyments —Jane Austen, Mansfield Park, 1814 • ... the waves, which poured in one continual torrent from the forecastle down upon the decks below — Captain Frederick Marryat, Peter Simple, 1834 • ... I was in a state of continual boozyness from the repeated seidels ... of bier which I had to drink — Henry Adams, letter, 7 June 1859 • The cold evening breeze ... sprinkled the floor with a continual rain of fine sand —Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island, 1883 So this sense of continual persisted in use, while at the same time continuous was developing a new sense to compete with it. And in spite of the inroads of continuous, this sense of continual is still used now: • ... the continual dread of falling into poverty — George Bernard Shaw, The Intelligent Woman's Guide to Socialism and Capitalism, 1928 • We live in a country where His Majesty's Cabinet governs subject to the continual superintendence, correction and authority of Parliament —Sir Winston Churchill, The Unrelenting Struggle, 1942 • Actually, there has been a kind of continual biological progression over the years —Adolf A. Berle, Center Mag., January 1969 • Or will the continual presence of abstraction in man's thought dry up ... the old springs of poetry? —Robert Penn Warren, Democracy and Poetry, 1975 Ironically, Miss Whately missed one genuine distinction, the one noted by Dr. Johnson. Continuous and not continual is used of continuity in space (even though continual was first in this use too, continuous had replaced it by Johnson's time): • Small windows, too, are pierced through the whole line of ancient wall, so that it seems a row of dwellings with one continuous front —Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Marble Faun, 1860 • Continuous quantity resists and even defies description in terms of disjunct ultimate units —Josiah Royce, The Spirit of Modern Philosophy, 1892 • ... the horses and chariots alone ... extended in a continuous line for more than six English miles — Sir James G. Frazer, The Golden Bough, 1935 • ... had transformed the woods and swamps of northern Europe into a continuous vista of wood and field —Lewis Mumford, Technics and Civilization, 1934 • Paper tape is a continuous medium —Susan Artandi, An Introduction to Computers in Information Science, 1968 But something must be conceded to Miss Whately's observation: continual is more likely than continuous to be used for repetition of something that may be interrupted. • His face had a beery, bruised appearance of a continual drinker's —Robert Louis Stevenson, New Arabian Nights, 1882 • There were continual quarrels —William Butler Yeats, Dramatis Personae, 1936 • What happens is a continual surrender of himself— T. S. Eliot, "Tradition and the Individual Talent," 1917 • I found it a continual agreeable surprise to realize that she was not "common" —Edmund Wilson, Memoirs of Hecate County, 1946 • You will also have to get used to continual visits from all the unbalanced people on the island, who love to plague editors —James Thurber, letter, 21 May 1954 And only continuous is used in a construction with with that emphasizes unbroken connection: • He believed that the former was continuous with the Middle Ages and the world of antiquity —J. M. Cameron, N.Y. Rev. of Books, 6 Nov. 1969 • Some claim that the animals acquired the essentials of human language and, in so doing, revealed capacities continuous with human cognition —Colin Beer, Natural History, May 1986 But we have many instances where both words are used in similar contexts: • ... though it was a mild night on the sea, there was a continual chorus of the creaking timbers and bulkheads —Jack London, The Sea-Wolf, 1904 • ... the continuous thunder of the surf —Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island, 1883 • ... the air was full of a continual din of horns — Leslie C. Stevens, Atlantic, August 1953 • There was a continuous rumble and grumble of bombardment —Siegfried Sassoon, Memoirs of a Fox-Hunting Man, 1928 • ... waspish, continual chatter about boys on the campus whom he suspected of perversion —William Styron, Lie Down in Darkness, 1951 • Thus, all the continuous talk of a "new Nixon" — George Strieker, Saturday Rev., 29 Apr. 1972 • ... a time of almost continual war —John Richard Green, The History of the English People, 1880 • ... a state of almost continuous warfare —Ted Morgan, Saturday Rev., 1 Nov. 1975 • ... as if some deep continual laughter was repressed —Hallam Tennyson, Encounter, December 1954 • ... the irrepressible and continuous crying which her happiness caused here —E. L. Doctorow, Ragtime, 1975 Part of the seeming indifference on the part of writers to a distinction so often repeated is to be explained by the writer's point of view—whether the writer perceives the subject as uninterrupted or not over time. This is obvious in the next two examples: clearly the wars and the trials had some actual breaks between them, but the writer views them as an ongoing and uninterrupted sequence. • ... the subcontinent will be rent by innumerable and continuous local wars —Hyman P. Minsky, Trans-Action, February 1970 • From 1948 on, purges and trials have been continuous —Wayne S. Vucinich, Current History, February 1952 To summarize the discussion thus far: many factors enter into the choice between continual and continuous. As we have seen, continuous is the usual word when the application is to physical continuation, continuation in space; nobody uses continual in this way. And it is true (though we have not tried to illustrate) that continuous is the only choice in a large number of technical applications, in mathematics, construction, manufacturing, biology, and more; continual has almost no technical applications. And because it has a much broader spectrum of application, continuous is the more common word. Yet, continual has been used since the 14th century in its primary sense of "continuing indefinitely in time without interruption" and is still used in that sense. Continuous is more recent in this application, having become established in it only in the 1830s, but it is very frequently so used in current English. Continual is the word most often chosen when the meaning is "recurring." It is possible for you to follow Miss Whate-ly's distinction or one of its modern versions, and many good writers do so. Others equally good do not, however. If you are a person who likes careful distinctions, H. W. Fowler's may lie closer to the actual use of continual and continuous in the areas in which they actually compete. Fowler 1926 says that that which is continual "either is always going on or recurs at short intervals & never comes (or is regarded as never coming) to an end." That which is continuous is that "in which no break occurs between the beginning & the (not necessarily or even presumably long-deferred) end." Here are two examples illustrating Fowler's distinction, and you may also wish to test it against the examples given above: • The promised visit from "her friend" ... was a formidable threat to Fanny, and she lived in continual terror of it —Jane Austen, Mansfield Park, 1814 • ... that, for 100 days or more, during the primary season, his life could be in continuous jeopardy —James MacGregor Burns, N.Y. Times, 14 Sept. 1979 |
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