ab extra

American  

[ahb ek-strah, ab ek-struh] / ɑb ˈɛk strɑ, æb ˈɛk strə /

adverb

Latin.

1. from the outside.

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Example Sentences

"It seems to me," he said, "that there is a guiding and directing principle ab extra which interacts with the material of the physical universe but is not of it."

From Time Magazine Archive

Those who are so fortunate as to occupy the philosophical position of spectators ab extra are very few in any generation.

From Among My Books First Series by Lowell, James Russell

Milton is the deity of prescience; he stands ab extra, and drives a fiery chariot and four, making the horses feel the iron curb which holds them in.

From Specimens of the Table Talk of Samuel Taylor Coleridge by Coleridge, Henry Nelson

We are conscious that he is a cold-blooded spectator ab extra striving to describe what he has never felt for himself.

From The Tale of Terror A Study of the Gothic Romance by Birkhead, Edith

In the early stages of all the colonies it is obviously inevitable that appointments ab extra to public office must occasionally, and even frequently, be made.

From Toronto of Old by Scadding, Henry