Search the Dictionary

ignorance; gloom; secrecy. Look, what you do, you do it still i' th' dark. Shak. Till we perceive by our own understandings, we are as mucdark, and as void of knowledge, as before. Locke.

Wanting the sense of hearing, either wholly or in part; unable to perceive sounds; hard of hearing; as, a deaf man. Come on my right hand, for this ear is deaf. Shak.

To perceive, discern, or decide. [Obs.] Granmer.

called "proofs;" and where agreement or disagreement is by this means plainly and clearly perceived, it is called demonstration. Locke.

Force; power; -- esp. in the phrase by dint of. Now you weep; and, I perceive, you feel The dint of pity. Shak. It was by dint of passing strength That he moved the massy stone at length. Sir W. Scott.

To cease to appear or to be perceived; to pass from view, gradually or suddenly; to vanish; to be no longer seen; as, darkness disappears at the approach of light; a ship disappears as she sails from port.

To see by the eye or by the understanding; to perceive and recognize; as, to discern a difference. And [I] beheld among the simple ones, I discerned among the youths, a young man void of understanding. Prov. vii. 7. Our unassisted sight . . . is not acute enough to discern the minute texture of visible objects. Beattie…

One who, or that which, discerns, distinguishes, perceives, or judges; as, a discerner of truth, of right and wrong. A great observer and discerner of men's natures. Clarendon.

obtain for the first time sight or knowledge of, as of a thing existing already, but not perceived or known; to find; to ascertain; to espy; to detect. Some to discover islands far away. Shak.

Capable of being discovered, found out, or perceived; as, many minute animals are discoverable only by the help of the microscope; truths discoverable by human industry.

To make distinctions; to perceive the difference; to exercise discrimination; -- with between; as, a judge distinguishes between cases apparently similar, but differing in principle.

Subtile or invisible emanation; exhalation perceived by the sense of smell; especially, noisome or noxious exhalation; as, the effluvium from diseased or putrefying bodies, or from ill drainage.

To take pleasure or satisfaction in the possession or experience of; to feel or perceive with pleasure; to be delighted with; as, to enjoy the dainties of a feast; to enjoy conversation.

To catch sight of; to perceive with the eyes; to discover, as a distant object partly concealed, or not obvious to notice; to see at a glance; to discern unexpectedly; to spy; as, to espy land; to espy a man in a crowd. As one of them opened his sack to give his ass provender in the inn, . . . he espied his money. Gen.…

state of war. The existence therefore, of a phenomenon, is but another word for its being perceived, or for the inferred possibility of perceiving it. J. S. Mill.

, To try; to know, perceive, or prove, by trial experience. [Obs.] Sir T. Herbert.

The faculty by which the mind forms an image or a representation of anything perceived before; the power of combining and modifying such objects into new pictures or images; the power of readily and happily creating and recalling such objects for the purpose of amusement, wit, or embellishment; imagination. In the soul…

To perceive by the touch; to take cognizance of by means of the nerves of sensation distributed all over the body, especially by those of the skin; to have sensation excited by contact of (a thing) with the body or limbs. Who feel Those rods of scorpions and those whips of steel. Creecn.

The sense by which the mind, through certain nerves of the body, perceives external objects, or certain states of the body itself; that one of the five senses which resides in the general nerves of sensation distributed over the body, especially in its surface; the sense of touch; nervous sensibility to external object…

To learn by experience or trial; to perceive; to experience; to discover by the intellect or the feelings; to detect; to feel. "I find you passing gentle." Shak. The torrid zone is now found habitable. Cowley.