Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary · 1913

Discern

Discern , transitive verb

[French discerner, Latin discernere, discretum; dis- + cernere to separate, distinguish. See Certain, and compare Discreet.]

1.
To see and identify by noting a difference or differences; to note the distinctive character of; to discriminate; to distinguish.
To discern such buds as are fit to produce blossoms. — Boyle
A counterfeit stone which thine eye can not discern from a right stone. — Robynson (More's Utopia)
2.
To see by the eye or by the understanding; to perceive and recognize; as, to discern a difference.
And [I] beheld among the simple ones, I discerned among the youths, a young man void of understanding. — Bible (KJV) - Proverb vii. 7
Our unassisted sight... is not acute enough to discern the minute texture of visible objects. — Beattie
I wake, and I discern the truth. — Tennyson

Discern , intransitive verb

1.
To see or understand the difference; to make distinction; as, to discern between good and evil, truth and falsehood.
More than sixscore thousand that cannot discern between their right hand their left. — Jonah iv. 11
2.
To make cognizance. [Obsolete] — Bacon