Live"li*ness, n. [From Lively.]

1.

The quality or state of being lively or animated; sprightliness; vivacity; animation; spirit; as, the liveliness of youth, contrasted with the gravity of age.

B. Jonson.

2.

An appearance of life, animation, or spirit; as, the liveliness of the eye or the countenance in a portrait.

3.

Briskness; activity; effervescence, as of liquors.

Syn. -- Sprightliness; gayety; animation; vivacity; smartness; briskness; activity. -- Liveliness, Gayety, Animation, Vivacity. Liveliness is an habitual feeling of life and interest; gayety refers more to a temporary excitement of the animal spirits; animation implies a warmth of emotion and a corresponding vividness of expressing it, awakened by the presence of something which strongly affects the mind; vivacity is a feeling between liveliness and animation, having the permanency of the one, and, to some extent, the warmth of the other. Liveliness of imagination; gayety of heart; animation of countenance; vivacity of gesture or conversation.

 

© Webster 1913.

Log in or register to write something here or to contact authors.