Plural of lapse; brief failures or mistakes, often a temporary falling away from expected behavior or memory.
From Latin 'lapsus' meaning a sliding or falling (from 'labi' = to slide). Originally meant a physical slip, evolved to mean mental mistakes and moral failures.
A 'lapse in memory' or a 'moral lapse' suggests something that happened briefly then passed—the image of sliding or slipping captures how humans aren't perfect and have momentary failures of concentration or character!
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