Some 16th-century Italian clergymen tried to ban coffee because they believed it to be “satanic.” However, Pope Clement VII loved coffee so much that he lifted the ban and had coffee baptized in 1600.
OBLIGING
complaisant, obliging
(adjective) showing a cheerful willingness to do favors for others; “to close one’s eyes like a complaisant husband whose wife has taken a lover”; “the obliging waiter was in no hurry for us to leave”
Source: WordNet® 3.1
Adjective
obliging (comparative more obliging, superlative most obliging)
Happy and ready to do favours for others.
Synonyms
• accommodating, willing
Verb
obliging
present participle of oblige
Noun
obliging (plural obligings)
The imposition of an obligation.
Source: Wiktionary
O*bli"ging, a.
Definition: Putting under obligation; disposed to oblige or do favors; hence, helpful; civil; kind. Mons.Strozzi has many curiosities, and is very obliging to a stranger who desires the sight of them. Addison.
Syn.
– Civil; complaisant; courteous; kind, -- Obliging, Kind, Complaisant. One is kind who desires to see others happy; one is complaisant who endeavors to make them so in social intercourse by attentions calculated to please; one who is obliging performs some actual service, or has the disposition to do so.
– O*bli"ging*ly. adv.
– O*bli"ging*ness, n.
OBLIGE
O*blige", v. t. [imp. & p. p. Obliged; p. pr. & vb. n. Obliging.] Etym: [OF. obligier, F.obliger, L. obligare; ob (see Ob-) + ligare to bind. See Ligament, and cf. Obligate.]
1. To attach, as by a bond. [Obs.] He had obliged all the senators and magistrates firmly to himself. Bacon.
2. To constrain by physical, moral, or legal force; to put under obligation to do or forbear something. The obliging power of the law is neither founded in, nor to be measured by, the rewards and punishments annexed to it. South. Religion obliges men to the practice of those virtues which conduce to the preservation of our health. Tillotson.
3. To bind by some favor rendered; to place under a debt; hence, to do a favor to; to please; to gratify; to accommodate. Thus man, by his own strength, to heaven would soar, And would not be obliged to God for more. Dryden. The gates before it are brass, and the whole much obliged to Pope Urban VIII. Evelyn. I shall be more obliged to you than I can express. Mrs. E. Montagu.
Source: Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary 1913 Edition
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Word of the Day
19 March 2025
CLEVIS
(noun) a coupler shaped like the letter U with holes through each end so a bolt or pin can pass through the holes to complete the coupling; used to attach a drawbar to a plow or wagon or trailer etc.
Coffee Trivia
