apprehension (a pre hens hon)

[F. appré hension, The increase in the number of apprehensions for drunkRae, Cont. Socialism, p. 345. enne . 3. A laying hold by the mind; mental grasp; the act or faculty ( a ) of perceiving anything by the senses; ( b ) of learning or becoming familiar with anything; (c) of forming an image in the imagination (the common meaning in English for three centuries, and the technical meaning in the Kantian theory of cognition); (d) of catching the meaning of anything said or written; (e) of simple apprehension (which see, below); ( f ) of attention to something present to the imagination. In apprehension, how like a god! Shak., Hamlet, ii. 2. They have happy wits and excellent apprehensions. Burton , Anat. of Mel., p. 233. To be false, and to be thought false, is all one in respect of men who act, not according to truth, but apprehension . South . Apprehension then is simply an understanding of the idea or fact which a proposition enunciates. J. H. Newman , Gram. of A ent, p. 18. The proper administration of outward things will always rest on a just apprehension of their cause and origin. Emerson , E ays, 1st ser., p. 215. Whatever makes a large impre ion upon the senses is, other things being equal, easy of apprehension , even when not of comprehension. Pop . Sci . Mo. , XXVIII. 352. 4. Anticipation of adversity; dread or fear of coming evil; distrust of the future. The sense of death is most in apprehension . Shak., M. for M., iii. 1. As he was po e ed of integrity and honour, I was under no apprehensions from throwing him naked into the amphitheatre of life. Goldsmith, Vicar, iii. Let a man front the object of his worst apprehension , and his stoutne will commonly make his fear groundle . Emerson, E ays, 1st ser., p. 215. Simple apprehension (ML., simplex apprehensio, first used by Jean Buridan, in the fourteenth century), in nom i nalistic logic, conception without judgment; the thinking of a name as distinguished from the thinking of a proposition: called simple because a term is simple compared with a proposition. - Synthesis of apprehension, in the Kantian philosophy, that operation of the mind by which the manifold of intuition is collected into definite images. It is called pure when the manifold operated upon is that of pure space and time. = Syn. 3. Comprehension, understanding, idea, notion.-4. Alarm, Apprehension, Fright, etc. (see alarm ), disquiet, dread, anxiety, misgiving, solicitude, nervousne , fearfulne .