a. Also 5–6 solyble, solible, 6 solubil. [a. OF. (also mod.F.) soluble, = Sp. soluble, Pg. soluvel, It. solubile, ad. L. solūbilis, f. solvĕre to loosen, dissolve, etc.]
1. Med. a. Of the bowels, etc.: Free from constipation or costiveness; relaxed. Now rare or Obs.
c. 1400. trans. Secreta Secret., 87. It [the medicine] shall make þe takere right noght solyble, or ellys ful litell. Ibid. (1450–80), 27. And it is good to travayle and to haue thi wombe soluble.
1539. Elyot, Cast. Helthe (1541), 25. Dry figges and old make the bodye soluble.
1563. T. Gale, Antidot., II. 81. Prouided alwayes that the pacient bee kepte soluble.
1620. Venner, Via Recta, i. 18. It … maketh the body soluble, and therefore sometimes good for such as are wont to be costiue.
1671. Salmon, Syn. Med., II. lviii. 345. The Cholick if it be gentle, and the Belly soluble, it is easily cured.
1772. Phil. Trans., LXII. 457. The belly should be kept soluble with lenitive Electuary, or any other mild purgative.
1843. R. J. Graves, Syst. Clin. Med., xvii. 196. The citrate of soda … tends to keep up a soluble state of the bowels.
† b. Laxative; causing looseness of the bowels.
1502. Arnolde, Chron. (1811), 171. To take drynkes solyble for to purgen the bodi of euyll humors.
1582. Hester, Secr. Phiorav., II. xxvii. 104. Give the Pacient … our Potion of Lignum Sanctum, the whiche is soluble and driying, and purgeth the bloud.
1620. Venner, Via Recta (1650), 249. They are of an attenuating and soluble faculty.
1704. J. Harris, Lex. Techn., I. s.v., This is the Soluble Tartar. ’Tis accounted a very good Aperitive Medicine.
2. Capable of being melted or dissolved.
1432–50. trans. Higden (Rolls), I. 319. In Scicille is white salte,… whiche, beenge soluble [L. solubilis] in the fyre, brestethe and brekethe in the water.
1764. Reid, Inquiry, iii. 90. It is probable that every thing that affects the taste, is in some degree soluble in the saliva.
1794. R. J. Sulivan, View Nat., I. 306. There results a soap which is soluble in water.
1814. Sir H. Davy, Agric. Chem., 273. To make it afford as much soluble matter as possible to the roots of the plant.
1853. W. Gregory, Inorg. Chem., 160. Borates … are for the most part insoluble. The alkaline borates alone are soluble.
1878. Huxley, Physiogr., 117. Whatever soluble constituents exist in the air will be absorbed by the rain.
b. As a specific epithet with names of substances.
1836–41. Brande, Chem. (ed. 5), 595. Solution of chlorine, or of the soluble chlorides. Ibid. The soluble nitrate of silver.
1843. R. J. Graves, Syst. Clin. Med., xxv. 321. The soluble mercury of Hahnemann was chiefly employed.
1861. Bentley, Man. Bot., 471. This forms common cocoa, rock cocoa, soluble cocoa, &c.
1875. Knight, Dict. Mech., 2244/2. For much that is valuable in the preparation and application of water-glass or soluble glass, we are indebted to Dr. Johann Fuchs, of Munich.
1899. Allbutt’s Syst. Med., VII. 684. Intramuscular injections of the soluble mercurial salts.
c. Dissolving, solvent. rare.
1846. G. E. Day, trans. Simon’s Anim. Chem., II. 358. It differs from it … in its power of resisting the soluble action of a cold solution of potash.
3. Capable of being untied or loosed. rare.
1613. T. Adams, Heaven & Earth Recon., 22. If Balaams Asse hath but an audible voyce, and a soluble Purse.
1847. Tennyson, Princess, V. 129. More soluble is this knot, By gentleness than war.
† 4. Plastic, pliable. Also fig. Obs.
1650. Trapp, Comm. Deut. ix. 22 (1867), I. 297/1. Keep our souls humble, supple, and soluble.
1683. Moxon, Mech. Exerc., Printing, § xi. ¶ 23. 80. This Canvass (to make it more soluble) is wet in Water, and the Water well wrung out again.
5. Capable of being solved or explained; solvable.
c. 1705. Bp. Berkeley, in Fraser, Life (1871), 422. In physiques I have a vast view of things soluble hereby.
1850. Carlyle, Latter-d. Pamph., i. 4. Questions not very soluble at present, were even sages and heroes set to solve them, began everywhere … to be asked.
1877. Sparrow, Serm., xxi. 280. I refer now to those subjects, which … have more the appearance of soluble questions.
6. Capable of being resolved; reducible.
1826. Syd. Smith, Wks. (1859), II. 98/1. A great deal of compliment to the wisdom of ancestors, and a great degree of alarm at the dreadful spirit of innovation, are soluble into mere jealousy and envy.
1858. O. W. Holmes, Aut. Breakf.-t., xi. 107. Love is sparingly soluble in the words of men.
