[? a. F. audition, 14th c. audicion, ad. L. audītiōn-em, f. audīre to hear.]
1. The action of hearing or listening.
1660. Stanley, Hist. Philos. (1701), 257/1. The act of the Object, and the act of Sense itself, as Sonation and Audition … differ only intentionally.
1881. J. G. Fitch, Lect. Teaching, viii. 252. What may be called audition—the listening to French sentences and rapidly interpreting them.
2. The power or faculty of hearing.
1599. A. M., trans. Gabelhouer’s Bk. Physic, 63/1. It draweth all out which is in the Eares, and administreth good auditione.
1867. Tyndall, Sound, ii. 74. The insect-music lying quite beyond his limit of audition.
3. An object of hearing, something heard; cf. vision.
1762. H. Walpole, Corr. (1837), II. 133. I went to hear it for it is not an apparition but an audition.
