post factoadj.adv.

1576 G. Whetstone Ortchard of Repentance 17 in Rocke of Regard A grote will buy his gift, A booke of notes..Wherein is writ full many a prettie shift, Post facto stuf, and Non est factum please.

1700 D. Defoe True-born Englishman ii. 43 As Laws Post Facto in the Parliament, In urgent Cases have obtain'd Assent; But are as dangerous Presidents laid by; Made lawful only by Necessity.

1769 A. Dalrymple Acct. Discov. S. Pacifick Ocean 73 For post facto reasoning is very clear in its determination; if every measure be taken for a rejunction, other objects must be given up.

1818 Times 7 Apr. 3/3 The post-facto act of the Congress of Vienna in 1815, cannot expunge the act of 1802.

1884 Atlantic Monthly Jan. 12/1 Endless vistas of reverie..endow the dreamer with a sort of post facto second sight, and leave him, when suddenly roused, as lost as if he had been asleep for a century.

1978 Archit. Design 5 June 307/2 London in 1900 must be seen in terms of English traditions, and not judged by post-facto wishful thinking.

1993 A. Brink On Contrary ii. 223 A feast undulating and reverberating through at least twenty-one days and nights (you will soon appreciate the impossibility of post facto certainty in this regard).

1650 Memorandums Conferences Brethren 7 The subscription did import..an approbation of their present possession of power or postfacto to confirm them in it.

1755 W. Huggins & T. H. Croker tr. L. Ariosto Orlando Furioso II. Annot. 3/1 A law established (post facto perhaps) to excuse writers.

1892 Atlantic Monthly May 657/1 ‘Deeds may need explanation post facto,’ remarked Del Ferice.

1928 W. H. Irving John Gay's London ii. 109 Crime pulsates, and generally the reasons for the variations in the ‘curve’ are post facto evident.

1954 A. J. P. Taylor Struggle for Mastery 338 But the Germans justified the French demand post facto when they changed their strategic plans in 1892.

1989 Nature 12 Jan. 115/3 Calculations of the thermal losses that can arise..give good agreement with experiment, post facto and with fitted parameters.

2004 Washington Post (Nexis) 25 Apr. b7 The Times scolded Powell post facto for not resigning to manifest his opposition to the president who appointed him.