repugnancy

noun

1. (countable, uncountable)The quality of being repugnant: offensiveness, repulsion.

   “[…] howsoever nature dictates, that government is necessary for the safety of the society, yet every singular person, by corruption and selfe-love, hath a naturall aversenesse and repugnancie to submit to any; every man would be a King himselfe […]”

   “If you be carved with any thing […] which you do not like, conceal (as much as in you lieth) your repugnancies, and receive it however: And though your disgust many times is invincible, and it would be insufferable tyranny to require you should eat what your stomach nauseates; yet it will shew your civility to accept it, though you let it lye on your plate, pretending to eat, till you meet with a fit opportunity of changing your plate, without any palpable discovery of your disgust.”

   “Even Pennant, with all his repugnancy to the toad, could not be induced to favour the popular belief in its poisonous character.”

2. (countable, uncountable)The quality of being repugnant: (logical) opposition, contradiction, incompatibility.

   “For if the paralleles be of this nature, that howe muche the nearer we are th’equinoctiall, so muche the greater is the heate: and howe muche the furder remoued from th’equinoctiall, so muche the colder the qualitie of the aire is: there must seme a manifest repugnancie, betwixt Auicenne, & the Geographers.”

   “[…] this Notion is the Source from whence do ſpring, all thoſe Amuſing Geometrical Paradoxes, which have ſuch a direct Repugnancy to the plain, common Senſe of Mankind, and are admitted with ſo much Reluctance, into a Mind not yet debauched by Learning: […]”

   “The first man, Adam, experienced no kind of repugnancy between the divine justice and the divine mercy.”

3. (archaic, countable, uncountable)Resistance, fighting back.

   “Why do fond men expoſe themſelues to Battell, And not endure all threats? Sleep vpon’t, And let the Foes quietly cut their Throats Without repugnancy?”