Forms: 6 facilitye, (facillitie, facylytye, fecility), 6–7 facilitie, 6– facility. [a. F. facilité, ad. L. facilitāt-em, f. facilis easy: see FACILE and -ITY.]
1. The quality, fact, or condition of being easy or easily performed; freedom from difficulty or impediment, ease; an instance of the same. Often in phr. with (great, much, more) facility.
1531. Elyot, The Boke Named the Gouernour, I. xxii. An induction or meane, howe children of gentyll nature or disposition may be trayned into the way of vertue with a pleasant facilitie.
1576. A. Fleming, A Panoplie of Epistles, 383. I cannot see what you may do wyth more facilitie and easinesse.
1597. Hooker, Eccl. Pol., V. iii. (1611), 191. The restless wits of the Grecians, evermore proud of their own curious and subtile inventions; which when at any time they had contrived; the great facility of their Language served them readily to make all things fair and plausible to mens understanding.
1649. R. Roberts, Clavis Bibliorum, ii. 20. That difficulties deterre not from the study of Scripture, ther are intermingled some facilities.
1791. Burke, App. Whigs (ed. 3), 121. The facility with which government has been overturned in France.
1805. Foster, Ess., I. ii. 17. The facility or difficulty of understanding.
1881. Westcott & Hort, Grk. N. T., Introd., § 29. The relative facilities of the several experimental deductions.
2. a. in sing. Unimpeded opportunity for doing something. Const. of, for, to with inf. In early use also: † Means, resources (cf. FACULTY).
1519. Four Elements, in Hazl., Dodsley, I. 27.
| Ye … have had great facility | |
| Strange causes to seek and find. |
1656. Duchess of Newcastle, Life Dk. Newcastle (1886), 317. To impoverish my friends, or go beyond the limits or facility of our estate.
1656. B. Harris, trans. Parival’s The History of This Iron Age, II. vii. He found great facility every where, and very little aversion any where, so strong was the zeal of Religion even yet, amongst those people.
1730. A. Gordon, Maffei’s Amphith., 347. The Facility of covering the Spectators with an Awning or Pavilion, was [with regard to the vast Height of the Amphitheatre, and the great Space it covered] not one of the least wonderful Things about the Building.
1859. Mill, Liberty, v. (1865), 60/1. The limitation in number … of beer and spirit houses … exposes all to an inconvenience because there are some by whom the facility would be abused.
1879. Cassell’s Techn. Ednc., I. 147/1. The utmost facility is allowed to the upper millstone of adjusting itself, so as to work as smoothly as possible over the lower stone.
b. in pl. (also every facility): Opportunities, favourable conditions, for the easier performance of any action. [So Fr. facilités from 17th c.]
1809. Wellington, in Gurw., Disp., IV. 357. He wishes to be permitted and to have the facilities given to him to return to France as soon as possible.
1825. M’Culloch, Pol. Econ. I. 35. The facilities given to the exportation of goods manufactured at home, and the obstacles thrown in the way of importation from abroad, seemed peculiarly fitted for making the exports exceed the imports, and procuring a favourable balance.
1865. Huxley, Lay Serm., ii. (1870), 28. So far from imposing artificial restrictions upon the acquirement of knowledge by women, throw every facility in their way.
1876. Patterson, in C. M. Davies, Unorth. Lond., 249–50. Though the work appears facile, those who went last year can attest that the facilities for ordinary traffic are apt to break down and interfere with comfort.
3. In action, speech, etc.: Ease, freedom, readiness; aptitude, dexterity.
1532. Hervet, Xenophon’s Treatise of Housholde, To the Reder. Xenophon, the scholer of Socrates, the whiche for his swete eloquence, and incredyble facilitie, was surnamed Musa Attica, that is to say, the songe of Athenes.
1596. Lodge, Wits Miserie, 57. Lilly, the famous for facility in discourse.
1602. Warner, Alb. Eng., Epit. (1612), 382. An ordinary care and skilfull Facilitie in collecting … their descents.
1736. Butler, Anal., I. v. Wks. 1874, I. 86. We are capable, not only of acting, and of having different momentary impressions made upon us, but of getting a new facility in any kind of action, and of settled alterations in our temper or character.
1762–71. H. Walpole, Vertue’s Anecd. Paint. (1786), III. 103. The stranger was to draw the picture as he could, and performed it with such facility and expedition, that his piece was in a manner finished when Lely’s was only dead-coloured.
1841. Disraeli, Amen. Lit. (1867), 475. Spenser composed with great facility; incessant production seems to have been his true existence.
1875. Jowett, Plato (ed. 2), I. 16, Charmides. Facility in learning is learning quickly.
b. Of style: Easy-flowing manner, fluency.
1588. Shaks., Loves Labour’s Lost, IV. ii. 126. The elegancy, facility, & golden cadence of poesie.
1700. Dryden, Fables, Pref. *B 1. Both writ with wonderful Facility and Clearness; neither were great Inventors: For Ovid only copied the Grecian Fables; and most of Chaucer’s Stories were taken from his Italian Contemporaries, or their Predecessors.
1879. O. W. Holmes, Motley, xv. 96. He proceeds with an increased facility of style, and with a more complete and easy command over his materials.
† 4. Easiness of access or converse, affability, condescension, courtesy, kindly feeling. Obs.
1550. Veron, Godly Saiyngs (1846), 22. Beseching moste mekely, yt ye of your wont goodness and facilitie vouchsafe to accept this my rude labour.
1677. Marvell, Lett. to Mayor of Hull, Wks. I. 287. This slid over, out of their facility to an old servant.
1791. Boswell, Johnson, 25 March, an. 1776. I wondered at this want of that facility of manners, from which a man has no difficutly in carrying a friend to a house where he is intimate.
1793. Smeaton, Edystone L., § 112, note. Our men were much struck and mightily pleased with the facility of the Portland ladies.
5. Easiness to be led or persuaded to good or bad, readiness of compliance, pliancy. Also rarely const. to with inf. Liability, readiness.
1533. More, Apol., xxxvi. Wks. 900/2. Of some facylytye of hys owne good nature … easi to beleue som such as haue told him lies.
1607–12. Bacon, Ess., Goodness (Arb.), 203. That is but Facilitie, or Softnesse; which taketh an honest Minde Prisoner.
1646. Slingsby, Diary (1836), 181. To all which ye King yeilds, wth a facility of nature.
1702. The English Theophrastus, 165. Licentiating any thing that is Coarse and Vulgar, out of a foolish Facility, or a mistaken Pity.
1848. Macaulay, Hist. Eng., I. 169. The facility of Charles was such as has perhaps never been found in any man of equal sense.
1875. Manning, Mission H. Ghost, viii. 216. Those who have in time past been guilty of any sin whatsoever have still remaining upon them what I may call the scar and the sear of those sins. But they have more than this. They have a proneness, and a weakness, and a facility to fall again.
b. in Scots Law.
c. 1565. Lindsay of Pitscottie, Chron. Scot. (1778), 179. In regard of the Facility of the Earl of Arran.
1861. W. Bell, Dict. Law Scot., s.v. As a ground of reduction, facility is quite distinct from incapacity.
c. transf. Of things: Flexibility, rare.
1856. Kane, Grinnell Exp., xliii. 401. It absolutely produced something like the nausea of sea-sickness to see the swell of the ice, rising and falling, and bending, transmitting with pliant facility the advancing wave.
6. Indolent ease, indifference.
1615. T. Adams, Two Sonnes, 68. They imagine that facilitie, a soft and gentle life is hence waranted.
1791. Boswell, Johnson, Advt. Those who read them with careless facility.
