compasses

Noun

Meaning

An instrument for describing circles, measuring figures, etc., consisting of two, or (rarely) more, pointed branches, or legs, usually joined at the top by a rivet on which they move.

Synonyms

Phrases with the word

Examples

We are asleep with compasses in our hands. W.S. Merwin

Justice to others and to ourselves is the same; that we cannot define our duties by mathematical lines ruled by the square, but must fill with them the great circle traced by the compasses. Albert Pike

I realized that searching was my symbol, the emblem of those who go out at night with nothing in mind, the motives of a destroyer of compasses. Julio Cortázar

If they be two, they are two so As stiff twin compasses are two, Thy soul the fixt foot, makes no show To move, but doth, if the other do. John Donne

For all the compasses in the world, there's only one direction, and time is its only measure. Tom Stoppard

When he wakes sometimes from dark dreams of broken cradles, and compasses without bearings, he pushes the unease down, lets the daylight contradict it. And isolation lulls him with the music of the lie. M. L. Stedman

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