after-event

plural after-events

1. alternativeAlternative form of afterevent.

   What I have promised to my wife, is a Law to me, prudence and after-events not controuling.

   1753 (indicated as 1754), [Samuel Richardson], “Letter XXVII”, in The History of Sir Charles Grandison. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to VI), London: […] S[amuel] Richardson; [a]nd sold by C. Hitch and L. Hawes, […], →OCLC, page 130

   3 more examples

   Sometimes it may bee requisite, in respect of after-euents: as if I sweare and vowe to God, to keepe some certaine spare and so straite a diet; as (through weakenesse and infirmities after happening) I can not possiblie obserue, without apparent daunger of the losse of my life.

   1593, Richard Cosin, chapter 2, in An Apologie for Sundrie Proceedings by Jurisdiction Ecclesiasticall, London, page 22

   Adeline thought little about it at the time; but often—oh! how often—did her memory dwell upon those accents, and recal that beloved voice, when after-events came thickening like briers in her path of life.

   1842, [Katherine] Thomson, chapter V, in Widows and Widowers. A Romance of Real Life., volume II, London: Richard Bentley, […], →OCLC, page 118

   Looking back now we all seem, with the wisdom of the after-event, to discern a kind of hush rather resembling the sort of tired selfishness that comes among a group of children towards the end of a picnic when they have eaten too much, played too much, and have become, because of submissive nurses and indulgent relations, too certain of their own importance.

   1928, Hugh Walpole, chapter 2, in My Religious Experience, London: Ernest Benn