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turn from the point in question; a trifling or evasive distinction; an evasion; a cavil. Quibbles have no place in the search after truth. I. Watts.

One who quibbles; a caviler; also, a punster.

A circuit; a winding. Hence: Circuitous way or proceeding; quibble; circumlocution; indirect mode of speech. After many ambages, perspicuously define what this melancholy is. Burton.

by low craft; to practice mean shifts; to use tricky devices; to play fast and loose; to quibble. Some dodging casuist with more craft than sincerity. Milton.

One who makes excessively nice or needless distinctions in reasoning; one who quibbles. "The caviling hairsplitter." De Quincey.

The practice or arts of a pettifogger; disreputable tricks; quibbles. Quirks of law, and pettifoggeries. Barrow.

other, from the direct course, or from truth; to speak with equivocation; to shuffle; to quibble; as, he prevaricates in his statement. He prevaricates with his own understanding. South.

in which two different applications of a word present an odd or ludicrous idea; a kind of quibble or equivocation. Addison. A better put on this word was made on the Beggar's Opera, which, it was said, made Gay rich, and Rich gay. Walpole.

One who puns, or is skilled in, or given to, punning; a quibbler; a low wit.

A trifling nicety; a cavil; a quibble. We laugh at the quiddities of those writers now. Coleridge.

Subtilty; nicety; quibble. "Nice, sharp quillets of the law." Shak.

rn; a starting from the point or line; hence, an artful evasion or subterfuge; a shift; a quibble; as, the quirks of a pettifogger. "Some quirk or . . . evasion." Spenser. We ground the justification of our nonconformity on dark subtilties and intricate quirks. Barrow.

cure; to make good; to soothe, as with an ointment, especially by some device, trick, or quibble; to gloss over. But Ebranck salved both their infamies With noble deeds. Spenser. What may we do, then, to salve this seeming inconsistence Milton.