Emily Dickinson Lexicon

AB-SCIS'SION, n. [See Absciss.]

1. A cutting off, or a being cut off. In surgery, the separation of any corrupted or useless part of the body, by a sharp instrument; applied to the soft parts, as amputation is to the bones and flesh of a limb. – Quincy.
2. In rhetoric, a figure of speech, when having begun to say a thing, a speaker stops abruptly, as supposing the matter sufficiently understood. Thus, “He is a man of so much honor and candor, and such generosity – but I need say no more.”