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Refer   /rəfˈər/  /rɪfˈər/   Listen
verb
Refer  v. t.  (past & past part. referred; pres. part. referring)  
1.
To carry or send back. (Obs.)
2.
Hence: To send or direct away; to send or direct elsewhere, as for treatment, aid, information, decision, etc.; to make over, or pass over, to another; as, to refer a student to an author; to refer a beggar to an officer; to refer a bill to a committee; a court refers a matter of fact to a commissioner for investigation, or refers a question of law to a superior tribunal.
3.
To place in or under by a mental or rational process; to assign to, as a class, a cause, source, a motive, reason, or ground of explanation; as, he referred the phenomena to electrical disturbances.
To refer one's self, to have recourse; to betake one's self; to make application; to appeal. (Obs.) "I'll refer me to all things sense."



Refer  v. i.  
1.
To have recourse; to apply; to appeal; to betake one's self; as, to refer to a dictionary. "In suits... it is to refer to some friend of trust."
2.
To have relation or reference; to relate; to point; as, the figure refers to a footnote. "Of those places that refer to the shutting and opening the abyss, I take notice of that in Job."
3.
To carry the mind or thought; to direct attention; as, the preacher referred to the late election.
4.
To direct inquiry for information or a guarantee of any kind, as in respect to one's integrity, capacity, pecuniary ability, and the like; as, I referred to his employer for the truth of his story.
Synonyms: To allude; advert; suggest; appeal. Refer, Allude, Advert. We refer to a thing by specifically and distinctly introducing it into our discourse. We allude to it by introducing it indirectly or indefinitely, as by something collaterally allied to it. We advert to it by turning off somewhat abruptly to consider it more at large. Thus, Macaulay refers to the early condition of England at the opening of his history; he alludes to these statements from time to time; and adverts, in the progress of his work, to various circumstances of peculiar interest, on which for a time he dwells. "But to do good is... that that Solomon chiefly refers to in the text." "This, I doubt not, was that artificial structure here alluded to." "Now to the universal whole advert: The earth regard as of that whole a part."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Refer" Quotes from Famous Books



... made of dealing with historical events and characters, it always seems fair towards the reader to avow what liberties have been taken, and how much of the sketch is founded on history. In the present case, it is scarcely necessary to do more than refer to the almost unique relations that subsisted between Henry V. and his prisoner, James I. of Scotland; who lived with him throughout his reign on the terms of friend rather than of captive, and was absolutely sheltered by this imprisonment ...
— The Caged Lion • Charlotte M. Yonge

... me to hold forth in a "scientific" way about my tree-loves,—to talk, for instance, of the Ulmus Americana, and describe the ciliated edges of its samara, and all that,—you are an anserine individual, and I must refer you to a dull friend who will discourse to you of such matters. What should you think of a lover who should describe the idol of his heart in the language of science, thus: Class, Mammalia; Order, Primates; Genus, Homo; Species, Europeus; ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 10, August, 1858 • Various

... whole north of Africa, west of Egypt, and the whole of Spain up to the Ebro, and the whole of Cyprus and a very large portion of Sicily, and that when the ancient writers, and even modern writers speak of Spain, the Carthagenians and northern Africa, they refer to the people who sprang from the commercial cities on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean sea, occupying a territory of not more than one hundred miles in extent north and south, and extending back into Syria not more than fifteen ...
— Prehistoric Structures of Central America - Who Erected Them? • Martin Ingham Townsend

... exile? Must I remind you of the anxious care the comte always took in his efforts to please, to watch, to protect that person for whom alone he lives—for whom alone he breathes? Well! I will do so; and when I shall have made you recall all the particulars I refer to, you will perhaps understand how it happened that the comte, having lost all control over himself, and having been for some time past almost harassed to death by De Wardes, became, at the first disrespectful expression which the latter pronounced respecting the person in question, inflamed ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas

... way for Sergey Ivanovitch approaching the table. Sergey Ivanovitch, waiting till the malignant gentleman had finished speaking, said that he thought the best solution would be to refer to the act itself, and asked the secretary to find the act. The act said that in case of difference of opinion, there must ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy


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