Class (?), n. [F. classe, fr. L. classis class, collection, fleet; akin to Gr. a calling, to call, E. claim, haul.]
1.
A group of individuals ranked together as possessing common characteristics; as, the different classes of society; the educated class; the lower classes.
2.
A number of students in a school or college, of the same standing, or pursuing the same studies.
3.
A comprehensive division of animate or inanimate objects, grouped together on account of their common characteristics, in any classification in natural science, and subdivided into orders, families, tribes, gemera, etc.
4.
A set; a kind or description, species or variety.
She had lost one class energies.
Macaulay.
5. Methodist Church
One of the sections into which a church or congregation is divided, and which is under the supervision of a class leader.
Class of a curve Math., the kind of a curve as expressed by the number of tangents that can be drawn from any point to the curve. A circle is of the second class. -- Class meeting Methodist Church, a meeting of a class under the charge of a class leader, for counsel and relegious instruction.
© Webster 1913.
Class (?), v. t. [imp. & p. p. Classed (?); p. pr. & vb. n. Classing.] [Cf. F. classer. See Class, n.]
1.
To arrange in classes; to classify or refer to some class; as, to class words or passages.
⇒ In scientific arrangement, to classify is used instead of to class.
Dana.
2.
To divide into classes, as students; to form into, or place in, a class or classes.
© Webster 1913.
Class, v. i.
To grouped or classed.
The genus or famiky under which it classes.
Tatham.
© Webster 1913.