LIABLE • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Liable

Add this Dictionary
to your website!
See more options...

/lˈaɪəbəl/ Listen

adjective

Liable adj.

Bound or obliged in law or equity; responsible; answerable; as, the surety is liable for the debt of his principal.

Exposed to a certain contingency or casualty, more or less probable; with to and an infinitive or noun; as, liable to slip; liable to accident.

Synonyms: Accountable; responsible; answerable; bound; subject; obnoxious; exposed. Liable, Subject. Liable refers to a future possible or probable happening which may not actually occur; as, horses are liable to slip; even the sagacious are liable to make mistakes. Subject refers to any actual state or condition belonging to the nature or circumstances of the person or thing spoken of, or to that which often befalls one. One whose father was subject to attacks of the gout is himself liable to have that disease. Men are constantly subject to the law, but liable to suffer by its infraction. "Proudly secure, yet liable to fall." "All human things are subject to decay."

See images of 'Liable'

Etymology of 'Liable'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

Share |

"Liable" Quotes from Famous Books

... partitions, allowing it to sink into the slight depth of molten matter. In this way, or perhaps by employing a solution of rubber instead of the sealing wax, the chambers will be well isolated and not liable to leak. The water is then introduced through the center openings of the disks before hermetically sealing the drum ...

— Scientific American Supplement, No. 481, March 21, 1885 • Various

... raise the status of the workmen is ill-directed towards raising or sustaining the rate of wages, else towards dictating concerning the management. This effort is ill-directed, first, because it is liable to aim at an impossibility—i.e. to extort from a master a wage so high that he prefers not to light his engine fires; next, because to raise the rate of wages does not secure continuous work, and ...

— Memoir and Letters of Francis W. Newman • Giberne Sieveking

... rebellion, and who now surrender, will, if they return to their Colonies, be determined by the Colonial Governments, and in accordance with the laws of the Colonies, and that any British subjects who have joined the enemy will be liable to trial under the law of that part of the British Empire to ...

— In the Shadow of Death • P. H. Kritzinger and R. D. McDonald

... majesty. Allow me to add, that the reputation of a woman seldom dies from a single blow—it expires gradually from repeated pricks of the needle. And queens are as liable to such mortality ...

— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach

... acknowledge that the educated man who breaks the laws is justly liable to a heavier punishment than he who has been born in ignorance, and bred, as it were, in the lap of sin; but we hardly realize how much greater is the punishment which, when he be punished, the educated man is forced to undergo. ...

— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope

More quotes...