Hypertext Webster Gateway: "obliging"

From Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913) (web1913)

Oblige \O*blige"\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. {Obliged}; p. pr. & vb.
n. {Obliging}.] [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.

From Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913) (web1913)

Obliging \O*bli"ging\, a.
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}.

Usage: 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.

From WordNet (r) 1.7 (wn)

obliging
adj 1: happy to comply [syn: {complying}, {yielding}]
2: 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" [syn: {complaisant}]


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