Word Direct Answers

What does "discover" mean?

Discover: To disclose; to lay open to view; to make visible; to reveal; to make known; to show (what has been secret, unseen, or unknown). Go, draw aside the curtains, and discover The several caskets to this noble prince. Shak. Prosperity doth best discover vice; but adversity doth best discover virtue. Bacon. We will discover ourselves unto them. 1 Sam. xiv.

Additional senses

  1. 2.Discover not a secret to another. Prov. xxv.
  2. 3.3. To 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.
  3. 4.To manifest without design; to show. The youth discovered a taste for sculpture. C. J. Smith.
  4. 5.To explore; to examine. [Obs.] -- To Discover, Invent. We discover what existed before, but remained unknown; we invent by forming combinations which are either entirely new, or which attain their end by means unknown before. Columbus discovered America; Newton discovered the law of gravitation; Whitney invented the cotton gin; Galileo invented the telescope.
  5. 6.To discover or show one's self. [Obs.] This done, they discover. Decke Nor was this the first time that they discovered to be followers of this world. Milton.

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