COMMON

1. If someone knows where to draw the line, they know at what point an activity or situation stops being reasonable and starts to be unacceptable. It is difficult for charities to know where to draw the line between acceptable and unacceptable sources of finance. Where do you draw the line about who the press can and can't investigate?

2. If you draw the line at a particular activity, you would not do it, because you disapprove of it or because it is so extreme. I'll do almost anything — although I think I'd draw the line at running naked across the stage! I have to draw the line somewhere. I refuse to go in for spiritualism. Note: There are several theories about the origin of this expression. It may come from early versions of tennis, in which the court had no fixed size: players agreed their own limits and drew lines accordingly. Alternatively, it may be connected with the 16th century practice of using a plough to cut a line across a field to indicate a boundary between two plots of land. A third possibility is that it refers to boxing matches in the past, when a line was drawn in the ring which neither boxer could cross. `Cross the line' may be based on a similar idea.