Literary notes about precede (AI summary)
In literature, "precede" is employed to signal that one event, idea, or element comes before another—whether in time, order, or importance. It is used to establish sequences in both narrative and argument, as when a preliminary thought or condition is set to lead into later developments ([1], [2]), and even to delineate spatial or social order, such as courteous behavior in allowing others to go before ([3], [4]). The term carries a dual role, marking not only chronological succession—as in the buildup to critical events or outcomes ([5], [6])—but also functioning as a device in grammatical constructions, where its order highlights meaning by positioning elements before others ([7], [8]). This dynamic usage enriches texts by clearly signaling what comes first, whether in action, reasoning, or descriptive detail ([9], [10]).
- These imaginative enterprises often precede thinking of the close-knit type and prepare the way for it.
— from How We Think by John Dewey - That is to say, not the conditions of pure reason, but only their effects in the internal sense, precede the act.
— from The Critique of Pure Reason by Immanuel Kant - If obliged to cross a plank, or narrow path, let any lady or old person who may also be passing, precede you.
— from The Gentlemen's Book of Etiquette and Manual of Politeness by Cecil B. Hartley - He took the key, opened the vault, and again courteously motioned me to precede.
— from Dracula by Bram Stoker - The attacking column, evidently; the sappers charged with the demolition of the barricade must always precede the soldiers who are to scale it.
— from Les Misérables by Victor Hugo - Successively, it requires that each act be balanced with those which precede and come after, so that order of activity is achieved.
— from Democracy and Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education by John Dewey - [177] Note that adjectives precede their nouns when the quality expressed is characteristic of the noun.
— from Heath's Modern Language Series: The Spanish American Reader by Ernesto Nelson - Grande belongs to the class of adjectives having different meanings according to whether they precede or follow the noun.
— from Heath's Modern Language Series: The Spanish American Reader by Ernesto Nelson - The parts of the stream that precede these substantive conclusions are but the means of the latter's attainment.
— from The Principles of Psychology, Volume 1 (of 2) by William James - As the birth of the body must precede the birth of the mind, so the training of the body must precede the cultivation of the mind.
— from Emile by Jean-Jacques Rousseau
