contain multitudes

Verb

contain multitudes (third-person singular simple present contains multitudes, present participle containing multitudes, simple past and past participle contained multitudes)

1. (idiomatic, intransitive) To have a complex and apparently paradoxical nature; to be inconsistent, especially in a way that is ultimately admirable or noble.
   • Do I contradict myself? / Very well then … I contradict myself; / I am large … I contain multitudes.1855 July 4, Walt Whitman, “[Song of Myself]”, in Leaves of Grass, Brooklyn, New York, N.Y.: [James and Andrew Rome], →OCLC, page 55
   • Mirror in My House is both a portrait of the artist ([Seán] O'Casey himself) and a portrait of an artist (a fictional John-Johnny-Sean Casside who contains multitudes), yet it is the unrelenting single vision of a particular personality with a fixed point of view.1970, Bernard Benstock, Sean O’Casey, Lewisburg, Pa.: Bucknell University Press, →OCLC