readiness

readiness, ease, facility, dexterity are comparable when they mean the power of doing something without evidence of effort, or the quality of work that manifests such effortlessness.

Readiness lays stress on the quickness or promptitude with which something is done

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his readiness in repartee

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a happy readiness of conversation— Austen

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Ease, which is probably more often used of the quality than of the power, suggests not only a lack of all signs of strain or care but an absence of signs of hesitation or uncertainty, with resulting evenness in performance and, especially in spoken or written discourse, fluency, directness, grace, and simplicity in expression

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true ease in writing comes from art, not chance— Pope

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ease and strength, effort and weakness, go together— Shaw

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Constance was surprised at the ease which he displayed in the conduct of practical affairs— Bennett

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Facility is sometimes used in a derogatory sense nearly equivalent to shallowness

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his facility in language has been fatal only too often to his logic and philosophy— J. C. Van Dyke

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More frequently this feeling is lost and facility may be interchangeable with ease, though it tends more often than ease to express the power, proceeding from practice and use, of performing an act or dispatching a task with lightness and address

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by the use of a few English words and the dramatic facility to express complex thoughts in pantomime, she was quite capable of carrying on extended conversations— Mailer

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I loathed algebra at first, although afterwards I had some facility in it— Russell

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Dexterity implies both readiness and facility, but it carries a stronger implication than any of the preceding words of previous training or practice and of proficiency or skill

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his amazing dexterity in argument

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absorbed in his own dexterity and in the proposition of trying to deceive a fish with a bird's feather and a bit of hair— Cheever

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Analogous words: quickness, promptness, aptness (see corresponding adjectives at QUICK): alacrity, *celerity, legerity: fluency, eloquence, volubility (see corresponding adjectives at VOCAL)

Contrasted words: *effort, exertion, pains, trouble