passage Hear it!

passage Definition

pas·sage (pas′ij)

noun

  1. the act of passing; specif.,
    1. movement from one place to another; migration birds of passage
    2. change or progress from one process or condition to another; transition
    3. the enactment of a law by a legislative body
  2. permission, right, or a chance to pass
  3. a journey, esp. by water; voyage
    1. the accommodations of a passenger, esp. on a ship
    2. the charge for such accommodations
  5. a way or means of passing; specif.,
    1. a road or path
    2. a channel, duct, etc.
    3. a hall or corridor that is an entrance or exit or onto which several rooms open; passageway
  6. that which happens or takes place between persons; interchange, as of blows or words
    1. a short segment of a written work or speech a Bible passage
    2. a section or detail of a painting, drawing, etc.
  8. Med. a bowel movement
  9. Music a short section of a composition, especially one displaying technical skill

Etymology: OFr < passer: see pass & -age

intransitive verb -·saged, -·sag·ing

to make a passage, or voyage; journey

passage Synonyms

passage

n.

  1. A journey

    voyage, crossing, trek; see journey.

  2. A passageway

    way, exit, entrance, corridor, tunnel; see also hall 2.

  3. A reading

    section, portion, paragraph; see reading 3.

passage Usage Examples

Preposition: of

  • prwora: Passage of prwora who are on pool amount for.
  • scripture: What I mean is that the particular passage of scripture or subject gets a grip in your heart.
  • prose: Patients are required to read text that looks like a passage of prose, but consists of random words.

Converse of object

  • quote: The Defense quoted a passage from a speech delivered, they said, in May 1992.
  • cite: In our terms, some of the Old Testament passages cited are clearly taken out of context.
  • obstruct: A mass in the lumen of the colon may completely or partially obstruct the passage of stools.

Adjective modifier

  • nasal: The spray action ensures the micro gel is transferred to the back of the nasal passage where the cold virus first takes hold.
  • biblical: Interpretation of a biblical passage, narrowly speaking, determines the meaning of the human author.
  • phreatic: The phreatic passages upstream were also looked at again but with no extra sections to add after the initial 1982 explorations.
  • narrow: A tall man stood in a narrow passage leading down to the city.
  • underground: The third story is of a large underground passage in the field to the south of the Abbey.
  • descriptive: Put it this way: some people praise Thomas Hardy's novels for their descriptive passages of nature.

Modifies a noun

  • wader: It is excellent for gulls and wintering wildfowl and can be very good for passage waders if the water levels are suitable.
  • migrant: A further 15 species visit the area in winter, and 104 species are recorded as passage migrants in spring and autumn.
  • grave: The extant examples are nearly all Clyde cairns, but one has the chambers set radially and one is a perfectly circular passage grave.

Noun used with modifier

  • rift: Carry on downstream from the Third Pitch for a few meters, until a thin rift passage enters up on the left.
  • perihelion: This is the origin of the appearance of the Winged Disk during Nibiru's perihelion passage.
  • testament: In our terms, some of the Old Testament passages cited are clearly taken out of context.
  • cave: A third type of cave passage is found in ancient, fossil remnants, located in the higher beds.
  • stream: At the foot, a small stream passage ends at a chamber where the way on may be up a rift on the left.
passage Quotes

And I'm afraid, reading this passage now, That everything I knew has been destroyed By those whom I admired but never knew; The laughing soldiers fought to their defeat And I'm afraid most of my friends are dead.

—Fenton,James

A confessional passage has probably never been written that didn't stink a little bit of the writer's pride in having given up his pride.

—Salinger,J(erome) D(avid)

Have you not learn'd great lessons fromthose who reject you, and brace themselves against you? or who treat you with contempt, or dispute the passage with you?

—Whitman,Walt(er)

Must we to bed indeed? Well then, Let us arise and go like men, And face with an undaunted tread The long black passage up to bed.

—Stevenson, Robert Louis

Read over your compositions, and where ever you meet with a passage which you think is particularly fine, strike it out.

—Johnson, Samuel known as Dr Johnson

   We used to say that a passage of good style beganwith a fresh, usual word, and continued with fresh, usual words to the end; there was nothing more to it.

—Ford, Ford Madox originally Ford Hermann Hueffer

Man is the shuttle, to whose winding quest And passage through these looms God ordered motion, but ordained no rest.

—Vaughan, Henry

There is a North-west passage to the intellectual World.

—Sterne, Laurence

Footfalls echo in the memory Down the passage which we did not take Towards the door we never opened Into the rose-garden. My words echo Thus, in your mind.

—Eliot,T(homas) S(tearns)

There anchoring, Peter chose from man to hide, There hang his head, and view the lazy tide In its hot slimy channel slowly glide; Where the small eels that left the deeper way For the warm shore, within the shallows play; Where gaping mussels, left upon the mud, Slope their slow passage to the fallen flood.

—Crabbe, George

This island rock in space turns flowering endlessly To peaks of cloud still mounting where you took Your last high passage and your faltering luck.

—Cicero full name MarcusTullius Cicero