Emily Dickinson Lexicon

LAPSE, n. [laps; L. lapsus, from labor, to slide, to fall. Class Lb.]

1. A sliding, gliding or flowing; a smooth course; as, the lapse of a stream; the lapse of time.
2. A falling or passing. The lapse to indolence is soft and imperceptible, but the return to diligence is difficult. – Rambler.
3. A slip; an error; fault; a failing in duty; a slight deviation from truth or rectitude. This Scripture may be usefully applied as a caution to guard against those lapses and failings to which our infirmities daily expose us. – Rogers. So we say, a lapse in style or propriety.
4. In ecclesiastical law, the slip or omission of a patron to present a clerk to a benefice, within six months after it becomes void. In this case, the benefice is said to be lapsed, or in lapse. – Encyc.
5. In theology, the fall or apostasy of Adam.