Definition of "eidolon"

eidolon

/aɪˈdəʊlən/

noun
plural eidola or eidolons
1. An image or representation of an idea; a representation of an ideal form; an apparition of some actual or imaginary entity, or of some aspect of reality.
  Quotations
  As a species it is extinct; as an eidolon it retains its corporeality – but only if maintained in a state of equipoise.
  1936, Henry Miller, Black Spring
  It was not hard to forge her image, her "eidolon", in the grey gloom of the little church.
  1974, Lawrence Durrell, Monsieur, Faber & Faber, published 1992, page 21
  Kit was sitting up staring into the dark at this eidolon, inelegantly turned out contrary to a whole raft of public-decency statutes, which had come monitory and breathing in to violate Kit's insomnia.
  2006, Thomas Pynchon, Against the Day, Vintage, published 2007, page 697
2. A phantom, a ghost or elusive entity.
  Quotations
  Was Philippe d'Orleans seen, this day, 'in the Bois de Boulogne, in grey surtout;' waiting under the wet sere foliage, what the day might bring forth? Alas, yes, the Eidolon of him was,—in Weber's and other such brains.
  1837, Thomas Carlyle, The French Revolution: A History […], volumes (please specify |volume=I to III), London: Chapman and Hall, (please specify the book or page number)
3. An unsubstantial image, spectre, phantom.