Literary notes about common (AI summary)
Writers employ the term “common” to evoke notions of the everyday and the shared, while also imbuing it with layers of cultural, legal, or philosophical significance. Its use ranges from denoting the mundane aspects of life—as when a character reflects on life’s ordinary nature ([1]) or distinguishes between sacred and everyday substances ([2])—to highlighting shared human attributes, such as common sense or mutual tastes ([3], [4], [5]). In other works, “common” marks customary practices and universal experiences, whether in the realm of law ([6]), social traditions ([7]), or even natural phenomena that occur widely across regions ([8], [9]). This versatility allows authors to contrast the ordinary with the exceptional, effectively underlining the universal aspects of human existence alongside its particularities ([10], [11]).
- Life appeared to me too common-place an affair as regarded myself.
— from Frankenstein; Or, The Modern Prometheus by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley - This differed from Aqua, or common water, as being of a sacred and prophetic nature.
— from A New System; or, an Analysis of Antient Mythology. Volume 1 (of 6) by Jacob Bryant - Inward are three—common sense, phantasy, memory.
— from The Declaration of Independence of the United States of America by Thomas Jefferson - ‘Mr. Dick,’ said my aunt triumphantly, ‘give me your hand, for your common sense is invaluable.’
— from David Copperfield by Charles Dickens - You have moral and literary tastes in common.
— from Mansfield Park by Jane Austen - But there the court of appeal, the Privy Council, has been largely composed of common-law
— from The Common Law by Oliver Wendell Holmes - It is a common saying that the child is a Jew before being baptized, and a Christian after the ceremony has been performed.
— from Heath's Modern Language Series: The Spanish American Reader by Ernesto Nelson - Their speed was slow, however, because pitfalls were somewhat common, and had to be guarded against.
— from The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Complete by Mark Twain - For I never did eat any thing that is common and unclean.
— from The Bible, Douay-Rheims, Complete - "What can there be," they say to themselves, "in this dry routine, in doing these common, ordinary things, to help me along?"
— from Pushing to the Front by Orison Swett Marden - Now this common sense cannot be grounded on experience; for it aims at justifying judgements which contain an ought .
— from Kant's Critique of Judgement by Immanuel Kant
