Definition of "earn"

earn¹

/ɜːn/

verb
third-person singular simple present earns, present participle earning, simple past and past participle earned or (chiefly UK) earnt
1. (transitive) To gain (success, reward, recognition) through applied effort or work.
  Quotations
  Carried somehow, somewhither, for some reason, on these surging floods, were these travelers, of errand not wholly obvious to their fellows, yet of such sort as to call into query alike the nature of their errand and their own relations. It is easily earned repetition to state that Josephine St. Auban's was a presence not to be concealed.
  1910, Emerson Hough, chapter II, in The Purchase Price: Or The Cause of Compromise, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company
  England will not be catapulted among the favourites for Euro 2012 as a result of this win, but no victory against Spain is earned easily and it is right they take great heart from their efforts as they now prepare to play Sweden at Wembley on Tuesday.
  2011 November 12, “International friendly: England 1-0 Spain”, in BBC Sport
2. (transitive) To receive payment for work.
3. (intransitive) To receive payment for work.
4. (transitive) To cause (someone) to receive payment or reward.
  Quotations
  '[T]hough I earned her a lot of money, I have nothing but regrets for what I did.'
  1965, James Holledge, What Makes a Call Girl?, London: Horwitz Publications, page 99
5. (transitive) To achieve by being worthy of.

earn²

verb
third-person singular simple present earns, present participle earning, simple past and past participle earned
1. (transitive, archaic) To curdle (milk), especially in the cheesemaking process.
2. (intransitive, obsolete) Of milk: to curdle, espcially in the cheesemaking process.

earn³

verb
third-person singular simple present earns, present participle earning, simple past and past participle earned
1. (transitive, obsolete) To strongly long or yearn (for something or to do something).
  Quotations
  And ever as he rode, his hart did earne / To prove his puissance in battell brave.
  1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto I”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, stanza 3
2. (intransitive, obsolete) To grieve.
  Quotations
  [M]y manly heart doth erne. […] Boy, briſsle thy Courage vp: For Falſtaffe hee is dead, and wee muſt erne therefore.
  1599, William Shakespeare, “The Life of Henry the Fift”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act II, scene iii], page 75, column 2

earn⁴

noun
plural earns
1. Alternative form of erne
  Quotations
  They gleamed on many a dusky tarn , Haunted by the lonely earn
  1805, Walter Scott, “(please specify the page)”, in The Lay of the Last Minstrel: A Poem, London: […] [James Ballantyne] for Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, […], and A[rchibald] Constable and Co., […]