1 a small mistake, especially one that is caused by forgetting sth or by being careless:
a lapse of concentration / memory * A momentary lapse in the final set cost her the match.
2 a period of time between two things that happen:
After a lapse of six months we met up again. * He wrote to us after a considerable lapse of time.
3 an example or period of bad behaviour from sb who normally behaves well:
I forgot to thank her for the invitation but I don't think she noticed my lapse.
verb [V]
1 (of a contract, an agreement, etc.) to be no longer valid because the period of time that it lasts has come to an end:
She had allowed her membership to lapse. * The treaty lapsed in 1995.
2 to gradually become weaker or come to an end:
His concentration lapsed after a few minutes. * This custom had lapsed over the years.
3 ~ (from sth) to stop believing in or practising your religion:
He lapsed from Judaism when he was a student.
lapsed adjective [onlybeforenoun]:
a lapsed subscription * lapsed faith * a lapsed Catholic
PHRASALVERBS
lapse into sth
1 to gradually pass into a worse or less active state or condition:
to lapse into unconsciousness / a coma * She lapsed into silence again.
2 to start speaking or behaving in a different way, often one that is less acceptable:
He soon lapsed back into his old ways.
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About this entry
This is a English–English dictionary entry.
Sourced from Main Dictionary in Lughet's collection.
This word also appears under other sources in Lughet's collection — see the list below.
This entry for lapse is sourced from Main Dictionary, one of the dictionaries and corpora merged into Lughet.
Is lapse a noun, verb, or something else?
In this entry, lapse is tagged as noun.
Does lapse appear elsewhere on Lughet?
Yes — lapse appears under other sources or language pairs in Lughet's collection. See the list below.
What is Lughet?
Lughet is a free trilingual dictionary covering nearly five million entries across Uyghur, Chinese, and English, drawn from more than ten source dictionaries and corpora.
