LUBRICATE • FREE-TRANSLATOR.COM • Definition of Lubricate

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/lˈubrɪkˌeɪt/ Listen

verb

Lubricate v. t.

To make smooth or slippery; as, mucilaginous and saponaceous remedies lubricate the parts to which they are applied. "Supples, lubricates, and keeps in play, The various movements of this nice machine."

To apply a lubricant to, as oil or tallow.

Hence: To reduce social frictions or difficulties between people, thus making cooperation easier and joint action smoother.

To inebriate by supplying with alcoholic beverages. (slang)

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Etymology of 'Lubricate'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Lubricate" Quotes from Famous Books

... by passing the finger and thumb firmly over the outside of the teat, is more likely to cause heat and irritation in it than a steady and full grasp of the entire hand. To show that this friction causes an unpleasant feeling even to the dairymaid, she is obliged to lubricate the teat frequently with milk, and to wet it at first with water; whereas the other mode requires no such expedients. And as a further proof that stripping is a mode of milking which may give pain to the cow, it cannot be employed, when the teats are chapped, with so much ease to the ...

— Cattle and Their Diseases • Robert Jennings

... in Mr. Arnot's employ would have echoed this sentiment, could the ill luck have blighted him without reaching them. In working his employes as he did his machinery, Mr. Arnot forgot that the latter was often oiled, but that he entirely neglected to lubricate the wills of the former with occasional expressions of kindness and interest in their welfare. Thus it came to pass that even down to poor Pat M'Cabe, man of all work around the office building, all felt that their employer was a hard, driving ...

— A Knight Of The Nineteenth Century • E. P. Roe