Verb

(en verb)

To detect with the senses, especially with the eyes.

* {{quote-book

, year=1875 , author=Jules Verne , title=The Survivors of the Chancellor , chapter=1 citation , passage=Meanwhile the brig had altered her tack, and was moving slowly to the east. Three hours later and the keenest eye could not have discerned her top-sails above the horizon.}}

To perceive, recognize, or comprehend with the mind; to descry.

* {{quote-book

, year=1842 , author=Charles Dickens , title=American Notes for General Circulation citation , passage=If they discern' any evidences of wrong-going in any direction that I have indicated, they will acknowledge that I had reason in what I wrote. If they ' discern no such thing, they will consider me altogether mistaken.}}

To distinguish something as being different from something else; to differentiate.

* {{quote-book

, year=1651 , author=Thomas Hobbes , title=Leviathan citation , passage=The severity of judgement, they say, makes men censorious and unapt to pardon the errors and infirmities of other men: and on the other side, celerity of fancy makes the thoughts less steady than is necessary to discern exactly between right and wrong.}}

He was too young to discern right from wrong.

To perceive differences.

Verb

(label) To perceive sounds through the ear.

(label) To perceive (a sound, or something producing a sound) with the ear, to recognize (something) in an auditory way.

*

, title=(The Celebrity), chapter=4 , passage=Mr. Cooke at once began a tirade against the residents of Asquith for permitting a sandy and generally disgraceful condition of the roads. So roundly did he vituperate the inn management in particular, and with such a loud flow of words, that I trembled lest he should be heard on the veranda.}}

(label) To exercise this faculty intentionally; to listen to.

* 1526 , (William Tyndale), trans. Bible , (w) X:

Agayne there was dissencion amonge the iewes for these sayinges, and many of them sayd: He hath the devyll, and is madde: why heare ye hym?

*{{quote-book, year=1935, author= George Goodchild

, title=Death on the Centre Court, chapter=3 , passage=It had been his intention to go to Wimbledon, but as he himself said: “Why be blooming well frizzled when you can hear all the results over the wireless. And results are all that concern me. […]”}}

(label) To listen favourably to; to grant (a request etc.).

(label) To receive information about; to come to learn of.

* 1667 , (John Milton), (Paradise Lost) :

Adam, soon as he heard / The fatal Trespass don by Eve, amaz'd, / Astonied stood and Blank [...].

(label) To listen to (a person, case) in a court of law; to try.

To sympathize with; to share the feeling or opinion of.