stage

n. [ OF. estage, F. étage, (assumed) LL. staticum, from L. stare to stand. See Stand, and cf. Static. ] 1. A floor or story of a house. [ Obs. ] Wyclif. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. An elevated platform on which an orator may speak, a play be performed, an exhibition be presented, or the like. [ 1913 Webster ]

3. A floor elevated for the convenience of mechanical work, or the like; a scaffold; a staging. [ 1913 Webster ]

4. A platform, often floating, serving as a kind of wharf. [ 1913 Webster ]

5. The floor for scenic performances; hence, the theater; the playhouse; hence, also, the profession of representing dramatic compositions; the drama, as acted or exhibited. [ 1913 Webster ]

Knights, squires, and steeds, must enter on the stage. Pope. [ 1913 Webster ]

Lo! where the stage, the poor, degraded stage,
Holds its warped mirror to a gaping age. C. Sprague. [ 1913 Webster ]

6. A place where anything is publicly exhibited; the scene of any noted action or career; the spot where any remarkable affair occurs; as, politicians must live their lives on the public stage. [ 1913 Webster +PJC ]

When we are born, we cry that we are come
To this great stage of fools. Shak. [ 1913 Webster ]

Music and ethereal mirth
Wherewith the stage of air and earth did ring. Miton. [ 1913 Webster ]

7. The platform of a microscope, upon which an object is placed to be viewed. See Illust. of Microscope. [ 1913 Webster ]

8. A place of rest on a regularly traveled road; a stage house; a station; a place appointed for a relay of horses. [ 1913 Webster ]

9. A degree of advancement in a journey; one of several portions into which a road or course is marked off; the distance between two places of rest on a road; as, a stage of ten miles. [ 1913 Webster ]

A stage . . . signifies a certain distance on a road. Jeffrey. [ 1913 Webster ]

He traveled by gig, with his wife, his favorite horse performing the journey by easy stages. Smiles. [ 1913 Webster ]

10. A degree of advancement in any pursuit, or of progress toward an end or result. [ 1913 Webster ]

Such a polity is suited only to a particular stage in the progress of society. Macaulay. [ 1913 Webster ]

11. A large vehicle running from station to station for the accommodation of the public; a stagecoach; an omnibus. “A parcel sent you by the stage.” Cowper. [ Obsolescent ] [ 1913 Webster ]

I went in the sixpenny stage. Swift. [ 1913 Webster ]

12. (Biol.) One of several marked phases or periods in the development and growth of many animals and plants; as, the larval stage; pupa stage; zoea stage. [ 1913 Webster ]

Stage box, a box close to the stage in a theater. --
Stage carriage, a stagecoach. --
Stage door, the actors' and workmen's entrance to a theater. --
Stage lights, the lights by which the stage in a theater is illuminated. --
Stage micrometer, a graduated device applied to the stage of a microscope for measuring the size of an object. --
Stage wagon, a wagon which runs between two places for conveying passengers or goods. --
Stage whisper, a loud whisper, as by an actor in a theater, supposed, for dramatic effect, to be unheard by one or more of his fellow actors, yet audible to the audience; an aside. [ 1913 Webster ]