prolegomenon

• The play, one feels, must remain unique, for the prolegomenon cannot be rewritten while the philosophy is unchanged. —  G. K. Chesterton, A Critical Study
• He gives an account of the various sciences, natural and philosophical, as a prolegomenon to the study of theology, even of the mystic teachings of Vital's Gates of Holiness_. —  The Haskalah Movement in Russia
• The miscellanies really stand to the novels in the relation of a sort of prolegomenon. —  Balzac
• ''Tis a pithy prolegomenon,' quoth I, and so   read on By all which it appears,' quoth I, having read it over   a little too rapidly, 'that if a man sets out in a post-chaise for Paris he must go on travelling in one all the days of his life, or pay for it Excuse me,' said the commissary, 'the spirit of the ordinance is   this, that if you set out with an intention of running post from Paris   to Avignon, ;c., you shall not change that intention or mode of   travelling without first satisfying the fermiers for two posts further   than the place you repent at; and 'tis founded,' continued he, 'upon   this, that the revenues are not to fall short through your fickleness O, by heavens!' —  Sterne
• ''Tis a pithy prolegomenon,' quoth I, and so read on By all which it appears,' quoth I, having read it over a little too rapidly, 'that if a man sets out in a post-chaise for Paris he must go on travelling in one all the days of his life, or pay for it Excuse me,' said the commissary, 'the spirit of the ordinance is this, that if you set out with an intention of running post from Paris to Avignon, &c.;, you shall not change that intention or mode of travelling without first satisfying the fermiers for two posts further than the place you repent at; and 'tis founded,' continued he, 'upon this, that the revenues are not to fall short through your fickleness O, by heavens!' —  Sterne

Roget's II: The New Thesaurus