Search the Dictionary

To give close attention with the purpose of hearing; to give ear; to hearken; to attend. When we have occasion to listen, and give a more particular attention to same sound, the tympanum is drawn to a more than ordinary tension. Holder.

terranean region. And shrieks like mandrakes, torn out of the earth, That living mortals, hearing them, run mad. Shak.

Pertaining, or suited, to the audition of small sounds; fitted to assist hearing.

To fail of hitting, reaching, getting, finding, seeing, hearing, etc.; as, to miss the mark one shoots at; to miss the train by being late; to miss opportunites of getting knowledge; to miss the point or meaning of something said. When a man misses his great end, happiness, he will acknowledge he judged not right. Lock…

To prevent seeing, or hearing, or speaking, by wraps bound about the head; to blindfold; to deafen.

One who deals in news; one who is active in hearing and telling news.

ix meaning of or pertaining to, serving for; as in auditory, pertaining to or serving for hearing; prohibitory, amendatory, etc.

as sounds by persons deaf from causes other than those affecting the nervous apparatus of hearing.

Assisting the sense of hearing; as, an otacoustic instrument.

An instrument to facilitate hearing, as an ear trumpet.

A hearing or an inspection, as of a deed, bond, etc., as when a defendant in court prays oyer of a writing. Blackstone. Oyer and terminer (Law), a term used in England in commissions directed to judges of assize about to hold court, directing them to hear and determine cases brought before them. In the U.S. the phrase…

A book formerly used by priests hearing confessions, containing rules for the imposition of penances; -- called also penitential book.

To cut off; to remove by clipping, shearing, etc.; to mow or crop; -- sometimes with off; as, to poll the hair; to poll wool; to poll grass. Who, as he polled off his dart's head, so sure he had decreed That all the counsels of their war he would poll off like it. Chapman.

To judge before hearing, or before full and sufficient examination; to decide or sentence by anticipation; to condemn beforehand. The committee of council hath prejudged the whole case, by calling the united sense of both houses of Parliament" a universal clamor." Swift.

accursed Milton. It is strange folly to set ourselves no mark, to propound no end, in the hearing of the gospel. Coleridge.

ychical deafness (Med.), forms of nervous disease in which, while the senses of sight and hearing remain unimpaired, the mind fails to appreciate the significance of the sounds heard or the images seen. -- Psychical contagion, the transference of disease, especially of a functional nervous disease, by mere force of ex…

To return for an answer. Milton. Lords, vouchsafe To give me hearing what I shall reply. Shak.

To use the sense of taste. [Obs.] By sight, hearing, smelling, tasting or savoring, and feeling. Chaucer.

y, or of perceiving changes in the condition of the body; as, the senses of sight, smell, hearing, taste, and touch. See Muscular sense, under Muscular, and Temperature sense, under Temperature. Let fancy still my sense in Lethe steep. Shak. What surmounts the reach Of human sense I shall delineate. Milton. The traitor…

stones, you worse than senseless things. Shak. The ears are senseless that should give us hearing. Shak. The senseless grave feels not your pious sorrows. Rowe. They were a senseless, stupid race. Swift. They would repent this their senseless perverseness when it would be too late. Clarendon. --- Sense"less*ly, adv. -…