PROLEPSIS • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Prolepsis

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noun

Prolepsis n.

(Rhet.)

(a)

A figure by which objections are anticipated or prevented.

(b)

A necessary truth or assumption; a first or assumed principle.

(Chron.) An error in chronology, consisting in an event being dated before the actual time.

(Gram.) The application of an adjective to a noun in anticipation, or to denote the result, of the action of the verb; as, to strike one dumb.

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Etymology of 'Prolepsis'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Prolepsis" Quotes from Famous Books

... smooth and thereby liable to a circular motion, like the celestial-orbs; and, when the Angels asked who could stand on so tottering a frame, Allah fixed it the next morning by throwing the mountains in it and pegging them down. A fair prolepsis ...

— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 4 • Richard F. Burton

... may be disposed to pronounce this as all mere mysticism. We answer, The living internal energy of religion is always mystical, it is grounded in feeling—a "sensus numinis" common to humanity. It is the mysterious sentiment of the Divine; it is the prolepsis of the human spirit reaching out towards the Infinite; the living susceptibility of our spiritual nature stretching after the powers and influences of the higher world. It is upon this inner instinct of the supernatural that all religion rests. I do not say every religious idea, but ...

— Christianity and Greek Philosophy • Benjamin Franklin Cocker

Words linked to "Prolepsis" : rhetorical device