READ, noun [See the Verb.]

1. Counsel. [Obs.]

2. Saying; sentence. obsolete

READ, verb transitive The preterit and participle passive read is pronounced red. [Gr. to say or tell, to flow; a speaker, a rhetorician. The primary sense of read is to speak, to utter, that is, to push, drive or advance. This is also the primary sense of ready, that is, prompt or advancing, quick. Latin gratia, the primary sense of which is prompt to favor, advancing towards, free. The elements of these words are the same as those of ride and Latin gradior, etc. The sense of reason is secondary, that which is uttered, said or set forth; hence counsel also. See Ready.]

1. To utter or pronounce written or printed words, letters or characters in the proper order; to repeat the names or utter the sounds customarily annexed to words, letters or characters; as, to read a written or printed discourse; to read the letters of an alphabet; to read figures; to read the notes of music, or to read music.

2. To inspect and understand words or characters; to peruse silently; as, to read a paper or letter without uttering the words; to read to one's self.

3. To discover or understand by characters, marks or features; as, to read a man's thoughts in his countenance.

To read the interior structure of the globe.

An armed corse did lie, in whose dead face he read great magnanimity.

4. To learn by observation.

Those about her from her shall read the perfect ways of honor.

5. To know fully.

Who is't can read a woman?

6. To suppose; to guess. obsolete

7. To advise. obsolete

READ, verb intransitive

1. To perform the act of reading.

So they read in the book of the law of God distinctly, and gave the sense. Nehemiah 8:3.

2. To be studious; to practice much reading.

It is sure that Fleury roads.

3. To learn by reading.

I have read of an eastern king who put a judge to death for an iniquitous sentence.

4. To tell; to declare. [Not in use.]

READ, participle passive red.

1. Uttered; pronounced, as written words in the proper order; as, the letter was read to the family.

2. Silently perused.

READ, adjective red. Instructed or knowing by reading; versed in books; learned. Well read is the phrase commonly used; as well read in history; well read in the classics.

A poet well read in Longinus -