figure vs form

figure

noun
  • A shape. 

  • A visible pattern as in wood or cloth. 

  • A number, an amount. 

  • A drawing or diagram conveying information. 

  • A human figure, which dress or corset must fit to; the shape of a human body. 

  • A form of melody or accompaniment kept up through a strain or passage; a motif; a florid embellishment. 

  • The form of a syllogism with respect to the relative position of the middle term. 

  • A figure of speech. 

  • The appearance or impression made by the conduct or career of a person. 

  • A person or thing representing a certain consciousness. 

  • A numeral. 

  • A horoscope; the diagram of the aspects of the astrological houses. 

  • Any short succession of notes, either as melody or as a group of chords, which produce a single complete and distinct impression. 

  • The representation of any form, as by drawing, painting, modelling, carving, embroidering, etc.; especially, a representation of the human body. 

  • Any complex dance moveᵂ. 

verb
  • To represent by a metaphor; to signify or symbolize. 

  • To write over or under the bass, as figures or other characters, in order to indicate the accompanying chords. 

  • To calculate, to solve a mathematical problem. 

  • To enter into; to be a part of. 

  • To think, to assume, to suppose, to reckon. 

  • To embellish with design; to adorn with figures. 

  • To embellish. 

  • To come to understand. 

  • To be reasonable. 

form

noun
  • The shape or visible structure of a thing or person. 

  • A specific way of performing a movement. 

  • A quantic. 

  • A class or year of school pupils (often preceded by an ordinal number to specify the year, as in sixth form). 

  • Constitution; mode of construction, organization, etc.; system. 

  • Show without substance; empty, outside appearance; vain, trivial, or conventional ceremony; conventionality; formality. 

  • A specimen document to be copied or imitated. 

  • A grouping of words which maintain grammatical context in different usages; the particular shape or structure of a word or part of speech. 

  • A blank document or template to be filled in by the user. 

  • Level of performance. 

  • Regularity, beauty, or elegance. 

  • The combination of planes included under a general crystallographic symbol. It is not necessarily a closed solid. 

  • A window or dialogue box. 

  • Characteristics not involving atomic components. 

  • A thing that gives shape to other things as in a mold. 

  • Established method of expression or practice; fixed way of proceeding; conventional or stated scheme; formula. 

  • The boundary line of a material object. In painting, more generally, the human body. 

  • A criminal record; loosely, past history (in a given area). 

  • The inherent nature of an object; that which the mind itself contributes as the condition of knowing; that in which the essence of a thing consists. 

  • An order of doing things, as in religious ritual. 

  • The den or home of a hare. 

  • An infraspecific rank. 

verb
  • To provide (a hare) with a form. 

  • To assume (a certain shape or visible structure). 

  • To mould or model by instruction or discipline. 

  • To constitute, to compose, to make up. 

  • To put together or bring into being; assemble. 

  • To treat (plates) to prepare them for introduction into a storage battery, causing one plate to be composed more or less of spongy lead, and the other of lead peroxide. This was formerly done by repeated slow alternations of the charging current, but later the plates or grids were coated or filled, one with a paste of red lead and the other with litharge, introduced into the cell, and formed by a direct charging current. 

  • To give (a shape or visible structure) to a thing or person. 

  • To create (a word) by inflection or derivation. 

  • To take shape. 

How often have the words figure and form occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )