Britannica 11th · 11th edition

Aposiopesis

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OCR text aligned to scanned pagesVol. 2, pp. 196-1961910–1911

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APOSIOPESIS (the Greek for " becoming silent "), a rhetorical device by which the speaker or writer stops short and leaves something unexpressed, but yet obvious, to be supplied by the imagination. The classical example is the threat, " Quos ego 1" of Neptune (in Virgil, Aen. i. 135).