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tact [tact 词源字典]: tact: [17] Tact originally denoted the ‘sense of touch’ (that is what Alexander Ross was referring to when he wrote ‘Of all the creatures, the sense of tact is most exquisite in man’, Arcana microcosmi 1651). But by the end of the 18th century it had evolved semantically via ‘refined faculty of perception’ to ‘skill in behaving or speaking with propriety or sensitivity’.

It was acquired via French tact from Latin tactus ‘sense of touch’, a noun use of the past participle of tangere ‘touch’ (source of English contact, tangent, tangible, etc). Tactile [17], from the Latin derivative tactilis, preserves the original notion of ‘touching’.
=> contact, contagion, tactile, tangent, tangible[tact etymology, tact origin, 英语词源]
feeling (n.): late 12c., "act of touching, sense of touch," verbal noun from feel (v.). Meaning "a conscious emotion" is mid-14c. Meaning "what one feels (about something), opinion" is from mid-15c. Meaning "capacity to feel" is from 1580s.
grope (v.): late Old English grapian "to feel about (as one blind or in darkness)," also "take hold of, seize, touch, attain," related to gripan "grasp at" (see gripe (v.)). Transitive sense "search out by sense of touch alone" was in late Old English. Figurative sense is from early 14c. Indecent sense "touch (someone) amorously, play with, fondle" (marked as "obsolete" in OED 2nd edition) is from c. 1200. Related: Groped; groping.
haptic (adj.): "pertaining to the sense of touch," 1890, from Greek haptikos "able to come into contact with," from haptein "to fasten" (see apse).
tact (n.): 1650s, "sense of touch or feeling" (with an isolated instance, tacþe from c. 1200), from Latin tactus "a touch, handling, sense of touch," from root of tangere "to touch" (see tangent (adj.)). Meaning "sense of discernment in action or conduct, diplomacy, fine intuitive mental perception" first recorded 1804, from development in French cognate tact. The Latin figurative sense was "influence, effect."
tactile (adj.): 1610s, "perceptible to touch," from French tactile (16c.) and directly from Latin tactilis "tangible, that may be touched," from tactus, past participle of tangere "to touch" (see tangent (adj.)). Meaning "of or pertaining to the sense of touch" is attested from 1650s. Related: Tactility.
tactual (adj.): "pertaining to the sense of touch," 1640s, from Latin tactus "a touch" (see tact) + -al (1).
taste (n.): early 14c., "act of tasting," from Old French tast "sense of touch" (Modern French tât), from taster (see taste (v.)). From late 14c. as "a small portion given;" also "faculty or sense by which the flavor of a thing is discerned;" also "savor, sapidity, flavor."

Meaning "aesthetic judgment, faculty of discerning and appreciating what is excellent" is first attested 1670s (compare French goût, German geschmack, Russian vkus, etc.).
Of all the five senses, 'taste' is the one most closely associated with fine discrimination, hence the familiar secondary uses of words for 'taste, good taste' with reference to aesthetic appreciation. [Buck]

Taste is active, deciding, choosing, changing, arranging, etc.; sensibility is passive, the power to feel, susceptibility of impression, as from the beautiful. [Century Dictionary]
touch (v.): late 13c., "make deliberate physical contact with," from Old French tochier "to touch, hit, knock; mention, deal with" (11c., Modern French toucher), from Vulgar Latin *toccare "to knock, strike" as a bell (source also of Spanish tocar, Italian toccare), perhaps of imitative origin. Related: Touched; touching.

From c. 1300 in transitive sense "bring into physical contact," also "pertain to." Other senses attested from 14c. are "perceive by physical contact, examine by sense of touch," also "be or come into physical contact with; come to rest on; border on, be contiguous with;" also "use the sense of touch," and "mention, describe." From early 14c. as "affect or move mentally or emotionally," with notion of to "touch" the heart or mind. Also from early 14c. as "have sexual contact with." Meaning "to get or borrow money" first recorded 1760. Touch-and-go (adj.) is recorded from 1812, apparently from the name of a tag-like game, first recorded 1650s. Touch football is first attested 1933. Touch-me-not (1590s) translates Latin noli-me-tangere.