CONSTRUE • DICCIONARIO INGLES.COM • Definition of Construe

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/kənstrˈu/ Listen

verb

Construe v. t. (past & past part. construed; pres. part. construing)

To apply the rules of syntax to (a sentence or clause) so as to exhibit the structure, arrangement, or connection of, or to discover the sense; to explain the construction of; to interpret; to translate.

To put a construction upon; to explain the sense or intention of; to interpret; to understand. "Thus we are put to construe and paraphrase our own words to free ourselves either from the ignorance or malice of our enemies." "And to be dull was construed to be good."

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Etymology of 'Construe'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Construe" Quotes from Famous Books

... prove so helpful. One of them, though he has since become an energetic man of business on the Pacific Coast, was certainly not helped into his present position by his Latin; for of all the translations I have ever heard or read of, one of his was the worst. Being called to construe the first line of the ...

— Volume I • Andrew Dickson White

... and had had to do with many very serious things indeed—things which touched even the life of his master. So it is no wonder that at this time of day he rather resented pains being taken with his education. It was like setting a double-first to construe ...

— Patsy • S. R. Crockett

... view as urged above). That all-knowing, all-powerful Brahman, which is the cause of the origin, subsistence, and dissolution of the world, is known from the Vedanta-part of Scripture. How? Because in all the Vedanta-texts the sentences construe in so far as they have for their purport, as they intimate that matter (viz. Brahman). Compare, for instance, 'Being only this was in the beginning, one, without a second' (Ch. Up. VI, 2, 1); 'In the ...

— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Sankaracarya - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 1 • George Thibaut

... vicinity of Covington; the city was placed under martial law, and every citizen was required to report himself for military duty. So persistent were the detectives in their search for treason, that all the business houses in the town had to be shut up, and it became so frequent a matter to construe thoughtless words into expressions of disloyal sentiment, that it was unsafe to speak any other language than Dutch. Thousands of respectable citizens, nightly left their comfortable homes, to cross the river, and shiver and ache with apprehension and fatigue, in the ditches ...

— History of Morgan's Cavalry • Basil W. Duke

... wrenching himself violently away from the benign influence, "it was not to sympathize with Hector, but to conquer with Achilles, that Alexander of Macedon kept Homer under his pillow. Such should be the use of books to him who has the practical world to subdue; let parsons and women construe it otherwise as ...

— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 5, No. 1, January, 1852 • Various

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