soft soap, n.
Also soft-soap.
[f. soft a.]
1. a. A smeary, semi-liquid soap, made with potash lye; potash soap.
| 1634 in Rymer Fœdera (1732) XIX. 567/1 That no soft Soap be sold..for above three pence the pound. 1641 Short Relation conc. Soap-Business 4 To make soft soape with Berilla. 1728 Chambers Cycl. s.v. Soap, The Soft Soap..is either White or Green. 1812 Sir H. Davy Chem. Philos. 331 Potassa enters into the composition of soft soap. 1883 Specif. Alnwick & Cornhill Rlwy. 11 In drilling the holes no oil is to be used, but only soft soap and water. |
b. With pl. A make or kind of this.
| 1783 Encycl. Brit. (ed. 2) X. 8196/2 In soft or liquid soaps,..cheaper oils are employed. 1857 Miller Elem. Chem., Org. vi. §2. 371 The base..of the soft soaps is potash. 1879 Cassell's Techn. Educ. I. 357/2 The hard, the soft, and the marine soaps. |
2. slang. Flattery; blarney; ‘soft sawder’. Also attrib. orig. U.S.
| 1830 Reg. Deb. Congress U.S. 12 Apr. 774, I will not use the vulgar phrase, and say he has been pouring soft soap down the backs of the New York delegation. 1842 People's Organ (St. Louis) 15 Apr. 2/2 The magnificent bombshell, rammed full of pride, aristocracy,..soft-soap, curiosity, folly, display, nonsense, man-worship and small-talk, was touched off. 1848 Bartlett Dict. Amer. 320 Soft soap, flattery; blarney. A vulgar phrase, though much used. 1861 Hughes Tom Brown at Oxford xxxiii, He and I are great chums, and a little soft soap will go a long way with him. 1901 Delannoy {pstlg}19,000, xxxix, ‘You're the most sensible woman I've ever met.’ ‘None of your soft-soap, now!’ 1934 Sun (Baltimore) 6 Nov. 2/2 Assailing Governor Lehman for his ‘soft soap’ manner of campaign, the park commissioner..renewed his assault on the Lehman banking family. 1961 Radio Times 6 Apr. 21/2 ‘Nobody likes to watch a soft-soap interview. People want the facts and they can take them,’ says Robin Day. 1977 Irish Times 8 June 9/6 The public would not be fooled by this ‘crazy parade of soft-soap offers’. |