Emily Dickinson Lexicon

WALK, v.i. [wauk; Sax. wealcan, to roll or revolve; wealcere, a fuller, whence the name Walker; D. walken, to work a hat; G. walken, to full, to felt hats; walker, a fuller, Sw. valkare; Dan. valker, to full or mill cloth; valker, a fuller; valke, a pad or stuffed roll; G. wallen, to stir, to be agitated, to rove, to travel, to wander. From the same root are Russ. valyu, G. wälzen, to roll, and wälsch, foreign, Celtic, Welsh, that is, wanderers. The primary sense is simply to move or press, but appropriately, to roll, to press by rolling, as in hatting, and this is the origin of walker, for the practice of felting hats must have preceded that of fulling cloth in mills. Our ancestors appropriated the verb to moving on the feet, and the word is peculiarly expressive of that rolling or wagging motion which marks the walk of clownish people. Qu. Heb. ילך.]

1. To move slowly on the feet; to step slowly along; to advance by steps moderately repeated; as animals. Walking in men differs from running only in the rapidity and length of the steps; but in quadrupeds, the motion or order of the feet is sometimes changed. At the end of twelve months, he walked in the palace of the kingdom of Babylon. Dan. iv. When Peter had come down out of the ship, he walked on the water, to go to Jesus. Matth. iv.
2. To move or go on the feet for exercise or amusement. Hundreds of students daily walk on Downing terrace, in Cambridge.
3. To appear, as a specter. The spirits of the dead / May walk again. – Shak.
4. To act on any occasion. Do you think I'd walk in any plot. [Obs.] – B. Jonson.
5. To be in motion, as a clamorous tongue. Her tongue did walk / In foul reproach. [Obs.] – Spenser.
6. To act or move on the feet in sleep. When was it she last walk'd? – Shak. [But this is unusual.] When we speak of somnambulation, we say, to walk in sleep.]
7. To range; to be stirring. Affairs that walk / As they say spirits do at midnight. [Unusual.] – Shak.
8. To move off; to depart. When he comes forth, he will make their cows and garrans walk. [Not elegant.] – Spenser.
9. In Scripture, to live and act or behave; to pursue a particular course of life. To walk with God, to live in obedience to his commands, and have communion with him. – Gen. v. To walk in darkness, to live in ignorance, error and sin, without comfort. – 1 John i. To walk in the light, to live in the practice of religion, and to enjoy its consolations. – 1 John i. To walk by faith, to live in the firm belief of the Gospel and its promises, and to rely on Christ for salvation. – 2 Cor. v. To walk through the fire, to be exercised with severe afflictions. Isa. xliii. To walk after the flesh, to indulge sensual appetites, and to live in sin. Deut. viii. To walk after the Spirit, to be guided by the counsels and influences of the Spirit and by the word of God, and to live a life of holy deportment. – Rom. viii. To walk in the flesh, to live this natural life, which is subject to infirmities and calamities. – 2 Cor. x. To walk in, to enter, as a house. Walk in, gentlemen.