Sample sentences for UNDERLIE - verbalworkout.com

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Definition

be or form the base for;
or: lie underneath

But the principal, underlying cause was that, as early as the beginning of the twentieth century, human equality had become technically possible.
George Orwell -- 1984

underlying = that is the basic (cause)

There lay another of those pieces of pink squareness that underlay the structure of the island.
William Golding -- Lord of the Flies

underlay = form the base of

I stopped for a long time to let my nerves settle, then leaned back from my tools and stared up at the face above, searching for a hint of solid ice, for some variation in the underlying rock strata, for anything that would allow passage over the frosted slabs.
Jon Krakauer -- Into the Wild

underlying = below the surface

You could grasp the mechanics of the Society you lived in, but not its underlying motives.
George Orwell -- 1984

underlying = causing

This is the underlying discovery of Noetic Science.
Dan Brown -- The Lost Symbol
[Pulling himself together for a great effort, and showing the philosopher that underlies the dandy.
Oscar Wilde -- An Ideal Husband
What you don't know— and she does— is that you have to shade the truth to get at the real truth, the underlying truth.
Robert A. Heinlein -- Tunnel In the Sky
There was an underlying consciousness all the while that he should have to master this anger, and tell her everything, and convince her of the facts.
George Eliot -- Middlemarch
It should be grudging, with underlying urgency.
J.D. Robb -- Glory in Death
In both words the underlying idea is that of a body of men united by an oath.
Nicolo Machiavelli -- The Prince
And maybe it's because of that underlying goodness that he can move a crowd—no, a country—to his side with the turn of a simple sentence.
Suzanne Collins -- Catching Fire
Put the other way round, our attention would have been held even more effectively had there been an underlying pull of simple narrative.
Ian McEwan -- Atonement
Levin saw that there was an idea underlying this question with which he did not agree.
Leo Tolstoy -- Anna Karenina
The underlying sense of what's presented these days is that this country has difference that ails rather than strengthens and enriches.
Chang-rae Lee -- Native Speaker
There is a simple network of wide tunnels that directly corresponds to the main street plan above, underlying the major avenues and cross streets.
Suzanne Collins -- Mockingjay
Disoriented and confused though she may be, she is exerting all her strength to comprehend the logic underlying this place-the basis of its existence.
Haruki Murakami -- After Dark
It took me a long time but I soon became aware of an underlying, pervasive fixation for violence among the people of the island.
Pat Conroy -- The Water is Wide
The underlying notion was, "It disgraces me to have been mentioned in connection with such a hag."
E.M. Forster -- A Passage to India
Underlying it all, a faint shimmer of silver that would reflect the light, magnify it.
Stephenie Meyer -- The Host
Maybe in the end the facts are not as important as the underlying truth she wants to convey.
Christina Garcia -- Dreaming in Cuban

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