Emily Dickinson Lexicon

GROPE, v.i. [Sax. gropian, grapian; G. grabbeln, greifen; D. grypen, grabbelen; Dan. griber, to gripe, to grope; Sw. grubla, Dan. grubler, to search. The sense is to feel or to catch with the hand.]

1. To feel along; to search or attempt to find in the dark, or as a blind person, by feeling. We grope for the wall like the blind. Is. lix. The dying believer leaves the weeping children of mortality to grope a little longer among the miseries and sensualities of a worldly life. Buckminster.
2. To seek blindly in intellectual darkness, without a certain guide or means of knowledge.