SCRUPLE

A weight of twenty grains; the third part of a dram.

Hence, a very small quantity; a particle. I will not bate thee a scruple. Shak.

Hesitation as to action from the difficulty of determining what is right or expedient; unwillingness, doubt, or hesitation proceeding from motives of conscience. He was made miserable by the conflict between his tastes and his scruples. Macaulay. To make scruple, to hesitate from conscientious motives; to scruple. Locke.

To be reluctant or to hesitate, as regards an action, on account of considerations of conscience or expedience. We are often over-precise, scrupling to say or do those things which lawfully we may. Fuller. Men scruple at the lawfulness of a set form of divine worship. South.

To regard with suspicion; to hesitate at; to question. Others long before them . . . scrupled more the books of hereties than of gentiles. Milton.

To excite scruples in; to cause to scruple. [R.] Letters which did still scruple many of them. E. Symmons.