Definition of "contemplate"

To love, at least contemplate and admire, / What I see excellent.

1671, John Milton, “The First Book”, in Paradise Regain’d. A Poem. In IV Books. To which is Added, Samson Agonistes, London: […] J. M[acock] for John Starkey […], page 1

We thus dilate / Our spirits to the size of that they contemplate.

1818, Lord Byron, “Canto IV”, in Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage. Canto the Fourth, London: John Murray, […], stanza CLVIII

There remain some particulars to complete the information contemplated by those resolutions.

1793 February 18, Alexander Hamilton, Loans, speech given to the United States House of Representatives

If a treaty contains any stipulations which contemplate a state of future war.

1826, James Kent, Commentaries on American Law

Since the launch early last year of […] two Silicon Valley start-ups offering free education through MOOCs, massive open online courses, the ivory towers of academia have been shaken to their foundations. University brands built in some cases over centuries have been forced to contemplate the possibility that information technology will rapidly make their existing business model obsolete.

2013 July 20, “The attack of the MOOCs”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8845