a. (adv.). Also 5–7 toller-. [a. F. tolérable (14th c. in Godef., Compl.), ad. L. tolerābilis that may be borne, that can bear or endure, f. tolerāre to bear, endure: see -ABLE.]
1. Capable of being borne or endured; supportable (physically or mentally); bearable, endurable.
1422. trans. Secreta Secret., Priv. Priv., 132. Suche a kynge is tollerabill, as many men thynkyn, for the more myschefe to Enchu.
1515. Barclay, Egloges, iii. (1570), B vj b/2. It were thing tollerable To becke and to bowe to persons honorable.
1582. N. T. (Rhem.), Matt. x. 15. It shall be more tolerable for the land of the Sodomites and Gomorrheans in the day of iudgement, then for that city.
1604. E. Grimstone, Hist. Siege Ostend, 157. Nakednesse, by reason of the … colde … is not very tollerable.
1653. Baxter, Worc. Petit. Def., 39. I abhor as much as most do … not bearing with each other in tolerable differences.
a. 1704. T. Brown, Two Oxf. Scholars, Wks. 1730, I. 9. He did not know how to maintain himself and his Family in any tolerable sort.
1834. Southey, Doctor, lxx. (1862), 149/2. The temperature of a glass-house is not only tolerable but agreeable to those who have their fiery occupation there.
1909. Westm. Gaz., 27 Aug., 2/2. Ideas … of making the motor less anti-social and more tolerable by the general public.
b. Of drugs: That may be endured, or of which the action may be resisted, by the human system: cf. TOLERANCE 1 b, TOLERANT a. c.
2. Such as to be tolerated, allowed, or countenanced; sufferable, allowable. Now rare.
1531. Elyot, Gov., II. ii. That langage that in the chambre is tollerable, in place of iugement or great assembly is nothing commendable.
1597–1603. W. Riding Sessions Rolls (Yorks. Rec. Ser.), 27. Misdemeanours not tollerable by the lawes of the Realme.
1598. Manwood, Lawes Forest, xii. § 4 (1615), 91. When there is no mast in the woods, then hogges nor swine are not tollerable there.
1619. T. Campion, Art of Descant (1674), 41. If the Bass be sharp in F fa ut, it is not tolerable to rise from a sixth to an eight.
1625. Bacon, Ess., Revenge (Arb.), 502. The most Tolerable Sort of Reuenge is for those wrongs which there is no Law to remedy.
1690. Locke, Govt., II. xiii. § 151. Where … the Executive is vested in a single Person,… that single Person in a very tolerable Sense may also be called Supream.
† 3. actively. Capable of bearing or enduring; tolerant. Const. of. Obs. rare.
1555. Eden, Decades, 99. The owlde souldiours … were … exceadynge tollerable of labour, heate, hunger, and watchynge.
4. Moderate in degree, quality, or character; of middling quality, mediocre, passable; now esp. moderately good, fairly good or agreeable, not bad.
1548. Udall, etc., Erasm. Par. Matt. v. 38. To the intent ye shoulde be of the meane and tollerable sorte.
1597. Hooker, Eccl. Pol., V. lxxxi. § 5. Wee are to descend to a lower step, receiving knowledge in that degree, which is but tolerable.
1658. Evelyn, Diary, 9 June. The new front towards ye gardens is tollerable, were it not drown’d by a too massie and clomsie pair of stayres of stone.
1693. Dryden, Disc. Orig. & Progr. Satire, Ess. (Ker), II. 110. We have yet no English prosodia, not so much as a tolerable dictionary, or a grammar.
1706. Phillips (ed. Kersey), Tolerable,… also indifferent, passable.
1790. Cook’s Voy., V. 1729. Some of it, which had adhered in lumps, was of a tolerable [ed. 1784, II. 235 sufficient] whiteness.
1833. L. Ritchie, Wand. by Loire, 53. The staircase is all that now exists even in toleraable preservation.
1835. Sir J. Ross, Narr. 2nd Voy., xl. 538. Found a tolerable road.
1866. Mrs. Gaskell, Wives & Dau., xv. He had eaten a very tolerable lunch.
1868. M. Pattison, Academ. Org., v. 209. Leisure and tolerable freedom from the anxieties of straitened means.
5. As adv. a. = TOLERABLY 2.
(After 1750 chiefly in inferior writers and dial.)
1673. Remarques Humours Town, 40. If you can but discourse tollerable of good Wine.
1711. Steele, Spect., No. 114, ¶ 1. I observed a Person of a tolerable good Aspect.
1796. Mrs. E. Parsons, Myst. Warning, III. 142. They halted at a tolerable large hamlet.
1823. J. F. Cooper, Pioneers, xxxviii. They … emerged at once into a tolerable clear atmosphere.
b. pred. In fair health; moderately or passably well: = TOLERABLY 2 b. colloq.
1847. C. Brontë, J. Eyre, xxvi. We’re tolerable, sir, I thank you.
