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Scruple   Listen
verb
Scruple  v. t.  
1.
To regard with suspicion; to hesitate at; to question. "Others long before them... scrupled more the books of heretics than of gentiles."
2.
To excite scruples in; to cause to scruple. (R.) "Letters which did still scruple many of them."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Scruple" Quotes from Famous Books



... on Mr. Gainor and tried to shut the picture of the sheriff out of his brain. But the desire to leap at the tall man was as consuming as the passion for water in the desert. And with a shudder of horror he found himself without a moral scruple. Just behind the thin partition of his will power there was a raging fury to get at Joe Minter. He wanted to kill. He wanted to snuff that life out as the life of Black Jack Hollis ...
— Black Jack • Max Brand

... you, I have safe in my possession a letter recommending you to me and signed with the forged signature of Mrs. Cornwallis English. If necessary to protect myself, I shall not scruple to exhibit that letter." ...
— Nobody • Louis Joseph Vance

... conscious that this train of reasoning passes through their minds. But that something like it is often made the occasion of substituting food which is less proper, for that furnished by Divine Providence, there cannot be a doubt. And the mischief is, that she who has gone so far, will not scruple, ere long, to go farther. And, strange and unnatural as it may seem, that mothers should turn over their children to be nursed wholly by others, in order to get rid of the inconvenience of nursing them at their own bosoms, it is only carrying out to its fullest extent, ...
— The Young Mother - Management of Children in Regard to Health • William A. Alcott

... has to be carried on whether we like it or no. To be too careful, too gingerly over the separate life, brings it all to a standstill. Meddle too much, and the Demiurge who set the machine going turns sulky and stops working. Then the nation goes to pieces—till some strong ruffian without a scruple puts it ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. I • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... positive and influential connection with Lucretia; and on the other hand a return to the poverty he recalled with disgust, and the terrors of his father's solitary malice and revenge,—he entered fully into Dalibard's sombre plans, and without scruple or remorse, would have abetted any harm to his benefactress. Thus craft, doomed to have accomplices in craft, resembles the spider, whose web, spread indeed for the fly, attracts the fellow-spider that shall thrust it forth, and profit by the ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... certain that two months ago, on that evening in May after he had dined with her, the moment, which was his moment, had been hers. She had been divided from him by no more than a hair's-breadth. And she had let him go for a scruple finer ...
— The Creators - A Comedy • May Sinclair

... understand the nature of it; neither could I entirely believe that those things which my confessors did not make so much of were so wrong as I in my soul felt them to be. One of them—I had gone to him with a scruple—told me that, even if I were raised to high contemplation, those occasions and conversations were not unfitting for me. This was towards the end, when, by the grace of God, I was withdrawing more and more from those great ...
— The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus • Teresa of Avila

... Spencers has been illustrated and enriched by the trophies of Marlborough; but I exhort them to consider the "Fairy Queen" as the most precious jewel of their coronet. I have exposed my private feelings, as I shall always do, without scruple or reserve. That these sentiments are just, or at least natural, I am inclined to believe, since I do not feel myself interested in the cause; for I can derive from my ancestors ...
— Memoirs of My Life and Writings • Edward Gibbon

... But, after all, why not? They had known each other all their lives. She laughed at the momentary scruple as they ...
— Rosa Mundi and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell

... better in this than Sophocles, for in the one Ulysses bemoans his wounds too vehemently; for the very people who carried him after he was wounded, though his grief was moderate, yet, considering the dignity of the man, did not scruple ...
— The Academic Questions • M. T. Cicero

... Pharisee, but he was not a Samaritan either. He had deliberately set himself to pull up any stray weeds of moral scruple that lingered in a mind stripped bare of Christian ethic, a task harder than some realize, since thousands of men who have no faith in Christ practise virtues that were not known for virtues by the Western world before Christ came to it. But every man is his ...
— Nightfall • Anthony Pryde

... sir!" protested the vice-president, "you mustn't ask impossibilities! You shall have the train at once, of course: you shall have my private car. But when it comes to the right of way, you'll have to appeal to Mr. Ford. Why, he doesn't scruple to lay out the United States mails ...
— Empire Builders • Francis Lynde

... their conduct, and everything as respects that country, as they would look upon the people and the affairs of England and Scotland. I will say, however, that, if I am disappointed in my hopes of tranquillity after a trial has been given to the measure, I shall have no scruple in coming down to parliament and laying before it the state of the case, and calling for the necessary powers to enable the government to take the steps suited to the occasion. I shall do this in the same confidence that parliament will support me, that ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan

... of his line. He was a drone by inclination, and a decided enemy to work. On the subject of honesty his principles were far from strict. If he could appropriate what did not belong to him he was ready to do so without scruple. This propensity had several times brought him into trouble, and he had more than once been sent to reside temporarily on Blackwell's Island, from which he had returned ...
— Paul the Peddler - The Fortunes of a Young Street Merchant • Horatio Alger, Jr.

... your money, or any thing else, without rendering an equitable return, is the core of all dishonesty, whether in the gamester, the pickpocket, the man who cheats in trade, or the boy who robs orchards. And a conscience once debauched by dishonest aims, will not, as I said, long scruple ...
— The Drummer Boy • John Trowbridge

... You never scruple to use the power which his love has placed in your hand. Your position of vantage may be read in a gesture, a look, a tone. Oh! darling, how truly are you the mad wanton your mother called you! You do not question, I fancy, that I am greatly Louis' superior. ...
— Letters of Two Brides • Honore de Balzac

... pursuit,—conduct which, as the victory was complete, could have no object but that of carnage. Nay, such was the ruffian nature of this man's soul, he fired into the Spanish ships which had yielded to the English, thus, for the sake of trivially injuring his enemy, sacrificing without scruple the blood of his own unfortunate friends. The Spanish prisoners, in their indignation at this brutality, asked their English captors to permit them to man their guns against the retreating French; and such was ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart

... and enrich my own, I will be so ingenuous as to confess, that I do not scruple, nor am ashamed, to rifle from all quarters, and that I often do not cite the authors from whom I transcribe, because of the liberty I occasionally take to make some slight alterations. I have made the best use in my power of the solid reflections ...
— The Ancient History of the Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians, • Charles Rollin

... at finding her conviction of Brusson's innocence confirmed in such a decisive manner that she did not scruple to tell the Count all, since he already knew of Cardillac's iniquity, and to exhort him to accompany her to see D'Andilly. To him all should be revealed under the seal of secrecy, and he should advise them what was ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann

... and, as an aid to his work, had established himself immediately in the graces of the military authorities. Quietly, privately, secretly, he pursued his quest, seeking out likely individuals whom he impressed into the service of His Majesty with not so much as a scruple as to means, fair or foul. Blackmail he employed freely and the pressure of unpaid debts reaped for ...
— The Loyalist - A Story of the American Revolution • James Francis Barrett

... as a nation is at stake, and when we are opposed by a remorseless foe which would gladly ruin us irretrievably? There is no halting half-way. It was these endless scruples which interfered with the prevention of the war under the imbecile or traitorous Buchanan; it is lingering scruple and timidity which still inspires in thousands of cowardly hearts a dislike to face the grim danger and ...
— Continental Monthly - Volume 1 - Issue 3 • Various

... flout and jeer and scorn me, the same right to watch and play the spy on me, to hearken at my door, and follow me, that they have! Ay, and the same right to bid me come and go, and answer at your will, that others have! Do you scruple a little at beginning?" she continued mockingly. "It will wear off. It will come easy by-and-by! For you ...
— The Long Night • Stanley Weyman

... cried. "You have compelled me to tell you! I came to these people; I duped them—and gloried in duping them. I despised them, understood them, traded on them without a scruple. Then you came. You came—and the scheme was shattered. The whole thing, that had bubbled and sparkled, became suddenly like flat champagne. That is a common simile, but it is descriptive. The acting of an actor depends upon his audience. While my audience was composed of ...
— The Mystics - A Novel • Katherine Cecil Thurston

... unseals them; His hatred, stirring a rebellious flame Within you, lends his enemy new charms. And, after all, why should a guiltless passion Alarm you? Dare you not essay its sweetness, But follow rather a fastidious scruple? Fear you to stray where Hercules has wander'd? What heart so stout that Venus has not vanquish'd? Where would you be yourself, so long her foe, Had your own mother, constant in her scorn Of love, ne'er glowed with tenderness for Theseus? ...
— Phaedra • Jean Baptiste Racine

... opportunity, which peculiar circumstances and long experience have afforded me, of judging of your heart and understanding,—to the superior excellence of which, (beyond all, I believe, that ever stood in your rank and high relation to society,) I fear not to advance my humble testimony, because I scruple not to say for myself, that I am no flatterer, and that I never found that to become one was the road to your ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan Vol 2 • Thomas Moore

... The Physitian being greatly troubled at the wickednesse of this mischievous woman, as voyd of all counsell and leysure to consider of the matter, and least he might give any cause of suspition to the standers by, or shew any scruple of his guilty conscience, by reason of long delay, tooke the pot in his hand, and presently drunke a good draught thereof, which done, the young man having no mistrust, drunke up the residue. The Physitian would have gone immediately home to receive a counterpoyson, ...
— The Golden Asse • Lucius Apuleius

... wishes it to be understood that he entertains the most profound veneration for the great and good men whose works seem to stand in the way of the following design to vindicate the glory of God, and which, therefore, he will not scruple to assail in so far as this may be necessary to his purpose. It is, indeed, a matter of deep and inexpressible regret, that in our conflicts with the powers of darkness, we should, however undesignedly, be weakened and opposed by Christian divines and philosophers. But so it seems to be, and ...
— A Theodicy, or, Vindication of the Divine Glory • Albert Taylor Bledsoe

... influence that will not stale, as mere ideas may. "Is there a single soul in this audience," said the Brahmo leader, the late Keshub Chunder Sen,[96] to the educated Indians of Calcutta, mostly Hindus, "who would scruple to ascribe extraordinary greatness and supernatural moral heroism to Jesus Christ and ...
— New Ideas in India During the Nineteenth Century - A Study of Social, Political, and Religious Developments • John Morrison

... He had no scruple, no pity any longer for the girl. There was no gain from the crime unless she spoke. He would have placed his head in the guillotine for nothing. He ran to the writing-table, tore off half a sheet of paper, and brought it over with a pencil to the sofa. He gave them to Vauquier to hold, and ...
— At the Villa Rose • A. E. W. Mason

... suppose so. I want to beg your pardon first for what I am going to say, De Vaux. If I make an ass of myself, don't scruple to say so! But I want to ask you this! Why, in thunder, did you let Adrea what's-her-name, the dancing girl, come ...
— A Monk of Cruta • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... by sympathetic despair. For, you must know, as far as his own feelings were concerned, sympathy alone influenced him. Personally, he was supremely indifferent about reaching the North Pole. In fact he did not believe in it at all, and made no scruple of saying so, when asked, but he seldom volunteered his opinion, being an ...
— The Giant of the North - Pokings Round the Pole • R.M. Ballantyne

... with the enemies of Grecian freedom—with the Persians, with Amyntas of Macedon, and with Dionysius of Syracuse. But she had now reached the turning-point of her fortunes, and her successes, which had been earned without scruple, were soon to be followed by misfortunes and disgrace. The first blow came from Thebes, where she had perpetrated her ...
— A Smaller History of Greece • William Smith

... a scruple, justified by her motherhood. They were keeping things from her, as they had kept them before. As they had kept ...
— The Judgment of Eve • May Sinclair

... methods of {179} military tyranny in which General Sarrail rejoiced without scruple and with a certain brutal pride. When once he found himself obliged to justify his conduct, he wrote: "The six inhabitants of Dianitza, who were shot, were Comitadjis. There is no doubt in that respect. Doubt still exists about eight others. If they are proved to be in the same case ...
— Greece and the Allies 1914-1922 • G. F. Abbott

... from hearsay; what then I have heard I have no scruple in telling. And perhaps it is most becoming for one who is about to travel there, to inquire and speculate about the journey thither, what kind we think it is. What else can one do in ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 2 • Various

... us as we with torches do, Not light them for themselves: for if our virtues Did not go forth of us, 'twere all alike As if we had them not. Spirits are not finely touched But to fine issues: nor nature never lends The smallest scruple of her excellence, But, like a thrifty goddess, she determines Herself the glory of a creditor, Both ...
— Montaigne and Shakspere • John M. Robertson

... reasons, stirred to the proper pitch of feeling. Mr. Swordsley, no doubt, was saying to himself: "If my good parishioner here can afford to buy a motor-boat, in addition to all the other expenditures which an establishment like this must entail, I certainly need not scruple to appeal to him again for a contribution for our Galahad Club." The Granger girls, meanwhile, were evoking visions of lakeside picnics, not unadorned with the presence of young Mr. Emmerton; while that ...
— The Choice - 1916 • Edith Wharton

... higher admiration. And as Patrick was one day preaching eternal punishment to those who resisted the commands of God, and the reward of eternal life to those who obeyed, his words were confirmed by the argument of an unheard miracle. For, lest any scruple of doubt should arise in their hearts, he revived, in the sight of all, nineteen men who had been dead and buried in their graves, one of whom, named Fotus, had lain in his narrow house for the space of ten years. And ...
— The Most Ancient Lives of Saint Patrick - Including the Life by Jocelin, Hitherto Unpublished in America, and His Extant Writings • Various

... inculcates; but revolving in his mind the probable reasons for Seraphina's hesitation, he came to this conclusion: she either loved him -[8] somebody else, or she did not love him at all. This conviction only X[9] his worst feelings, and he resolved that no [Symbol: scruple scruple][10] of conscience should stand between ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, July 24, 1841 • Various

... in the least degree impatient of scientific investigation! And (thirdly,) as if Religion depended, or could be made to depend, on Physical phenomena, or on the progress of Natural Science, at all! ... I scruple not to say that arguments like these impress me with the meanest opinion of Mr. Jowett's intellectual powers: while they prove to demonstration that he does not in the least understand the subject on which he yet writes ...
— Inspiration and Interpretation - Seven Sermons Preached Before the University of Oxford • John Burgon

... and jewelry in the house under Charlie's care whilst we were away, without the least risk, for such things they would never touch; but fruit or mealies they cannot be brought to regard as personal property, and they gather the former and waste the latter without scruple. It is a great objection to the imported coolies, who make very clean and capital servants, that they have inveterate habits of pilfering and are hopelessly dishonest about trifles. For this reason they are sure to get on badly with Kafir fellow-servants, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XVII. No. 101. May, 1876. • Various

... constrained, said: Well then, if you will needs have me to go on with the discourse, I will not do as you did, Aristodemus. For you were shy of repeating what this gentleman spoke, but I shall not scruple to make use of what you have said; for I think indeed you did very well divide mankind into three ranks; the first of wicked and very bad men, the second of the vulgar and common sort, and the third of good and wise men. The ...
— Essays and Miscellanies - The Complete Works Volume 3 • Plutarch

... it over," he said. "And, look you, it would take more than a scruple or two to keep me from yonder girl," and his evil eye flashed again at her ...
— The Prisoner of Zenda • Anthony Hope

... till others tell it. Reserved knowledge is always reserved strength; and if the man, as I hope he does not, intends evil to the Church, let him commit himself before you use your knowledge against him. True, you may have a scruple of conscience as to the lawfulness of allowing a sin which you might prevent. To me it seems that the sin lies in the will rather than in the deed, and that sometimes—I only say sometimes—it may be a means of saving the sinner to allow his root of iniquity to bear fruit, and fill him ...
— Hypatia - or, New Foes with an Old Face • Charles Kingsley

... sketched to her our campaign. "I take command—the others are flat on their backs. I save little pathetic Peg, even in spite of herself; though her just resentment is really much greater than she dares, poor mite, recognize (amazing scruple!). By which I mean I guard her against a possible relapse. I save poor Mother—that is I rid her of the deadly Eliza—forever and a day! Despised, rejected, misunderstood, I nevertheless intervene, in its hour of dire need, as the good genius of the ...
— The Whole Family - A Novel by Twelve Authors • William Dean Howells, Mary E. Wilkins Freeman, Mary Heaton Vorse, Mary Stewart Cutting, Elizabeth Jo

... friendships and other ties, information of their conspiracy made its way to Rome, and the consuls being ordered to resign their office before the usual time, in order that the new consuls might be elected the sooner to meet so important a war, a religious scruple entered their minds at the idea of the elections being held by persons whose time of office had been cut short. Accordingly an interregnum took place. There were two interreges, Marcus Valerius and Marcus Fabius. The consuls elected were Titus Manlius Torquatus a third time, and Publius ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius

... the purest orthodoxy held services of thanksgiving to God for cargoes of poor barbarians rescued from the darkness of heathendom and brought (though forcibly) into the gospel light. But though the Northerners had no more scruple about Slavery than the Southerners, they had far less practical use for it. The Negro was of no value for the sort of labour in which the New Englanders engaged; he died of it in the cold climate. Negro slaves ...
— A History of the United States • Cecil Chesterton

... his steps back across the field feeling righteous and triumphant. To him the interests of the Boy Scouts of America superseded every other interest and like the true missionary he did not scruple overmuch ...
— Pee-Wee Harris Adrift • Percy Keese Fitzhugh

... any time. He would have to be very careful not to offend Crass in any way. He was afraid the latter did not like him very much as it was. Easton knew that Crass could get him the sack at any time, and would not scruple to do so if he wanted to make room for some crony of his own. Crass was the 'coddy' or foreman of the job. Considered as a workman he had no very unusual abilities; he was if anything inferior to the majority of ...
— The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists • Robert Tressell

... I meant to win Lilian, that boast must be relinquished for ever. I should have to lie now with all my might, without limit or scruple, to dissemble incessantly, and "wear a mask," as the poet Bunn beautifully expressed it long ago, "over my hollow heart." I felt all this keenly; I did not think it was right, but ...
— Stories By English Authors: London • Various

... thing left was to get into the house—and that was a difficulty which to me singly would have been insurmountable; for I am terribly shy in making myself known to strangers and out-of-date kinsfolk. Love, stronger than scruple, winged my cousin in without me; but she soon returned with a creature that might have sat to a sculptor for the image of Welcome. It was the youngest of the Gladmans; who, by marriage with a Bruton, had become mistress of the old mansion. A comely brood are the Brutons. Six of ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb

... lacked courage. But he was vain enough to think that a few words from him might weaken Brant's steadfast loyalty. Furthermore, like too many frontiersmen of his day, he held the Indian race in little esteem and, as we shall see, he did not scruple to treat them with the basest kind of treachery. The plea may be made that he was apprehensive of duplicity on the part of the Mohawk chief, but this does ...
— The War Chief of the Six Nations - A Chronicle of Joseph Brant - Volume 16 (of 32) in the series Chronicles of Canada • Louis Aubrey Wood

... soldier's death, gallantly leading his men in the face of the enemy; and his memory will live among the gallant men who have done so much to keep the fine traditions of the British Army unsullied. He is buried with his brother officers near where he fell. If I can help you in any way, I hope you will not scruple to tell me. My wife will also have written to you, and is very anxious to hear if she can do ...
— Letters of Lt.-Col. George Brenton Laurie • George Brenton Laurie

... is inspired with the less fear of detection. There are some few hotel-keepers who, though they more than suspect the purpose to which the liquor these whites are demanding is to be applied, permit rapacity to overpower righteous compunction or scruple, and lend themselves, likewise, though indirectly, to the law's infraction. Happily, the penalty is now so heavy ($300) that the evil is, I think, ...
— A Treatise on the Six-Nation Indians • James Bovell Mackenzie

... common courtesy which no gentleman refuses to another, he will proclaim your name with the most opprobrious adjuncts to all the world, and in place of his former regard he will hold you in the most unlimited contempt, which he will have no scruple ...
— Queechy • Susan Warner

... persuaded but he might have done better, if he would but have spoke a good word for himself, or else have let me done it for him: instead of which, he never would so much as let me see any of his grand friends, though I would not have made the least scruple in the world to have asked them for any thing he ...
— Cecilia vol. 2 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)

... watched by people, who, to appearance, had been placed there for this purpose. For when I tried to wade in upon the reef, one of them took hold of my clothes and dragged me back. I picked up some small pieces of coral, which they required me to throw down again; and, on my refusal, they made no scruple to take them forcibly from me. I had gathered some small plants, but these also I could not be permitted to retain. And they took a fan from Mr Barney, which he had received as a present on coming ashore. Omai said we had done ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 15 (of 18) • Robert Kerr

... school, whose master is continually calling upon the pupils to declare whether or no they are guilty of this or that offense. The Quakers were forbidden by their doctrine of the oath to make answer in the form which the state required. And they suffered for this scruple as men have suffered for the maintenance ...
— William Penn • George Hodges

... intimate acquaintance which he himself could have had with that divine, would have informed him of those things which we, from our inspiration, are enabled to open and discover. Of readers who, from such conceits as these, condemn the wisdom or penetration of Mr Allworthy, I shall not scruple to say, that they make a very bad and ungrateful use of that knowledge which we have ...
— The History of Tom Jones, a foundling • Henry Fielding

... unquestionable evidences of veracity; and, as the writer made no scruple of committing his most secret thoughts to paper, encouraged no doubt by the confidence which he derived from the use of short-hand, perhaps there never was a publication more implicitly to be relied upon for the authenticity of its statements and the exactness with which every ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys

... headache and the rather agreeable lees of the last night's excitement. The young bloods, many of whom were still far from sober, had taken the kitchen into their own hands, vice the Chinaman deposed; and since each was engaged upon a dish of his own, and none had the least scruple in demolishing his neighbour's handiwork, I became early convinced that many eggs would be broken and few omelets made. The discovery of a jug of milk and a crust of bread enabled me to stay my appetite; and since it was Sunday, ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne

... his interpretation of duty. Is there any need to forestall Doomsday in these matters? The poor fellow was in both a fix and a fright. Alas! that duties should ever clash! His own view is given with his own decisiveness. "No! I never had a scruple at all about it. I have always felt great delight of mind when I recall the deed which started me upon so great an undertaking." The brothers of the Charterhouse gladly took him in, the year being about 1160, and his age about twenty, let us say; hardly an age anyhow which would fit him ...
— Hugh, Bishop of Lincoln - A Short Story of One of the Makers of Mediaeval England • Charles L. Marson

... every man concerned in either of those proceedings deserved the gallows, and fancied he could perform the office of executioner. He therefore made less scruple to require a pecuniary commutation for those offences, but thought the proceeds should be carried to a public account. Monthault laughed at this suggestion, said that self-preservation was the soldier's motto, and begged he would only bring the sum ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West

... had taught me to model myself in this respect entirely with a view to immediate consequences. If my genuine interest, on the whole, was promoted by veracity, it was proper to adhere to it; but, if the result of my investigation were opposite, truth was to be sacrificed without scruple. ...
— Memoirs of Carwin the Biloquist - (A Fragment) • Charles Brockden Brown

... advocated by the News and Courier, to let him be re-elected without opposition. But the old-time pride of race and party was too strong, and the Democrats nominated Wade Hampton. They supported him with little scruple as to means,—with free use of intimidation and proscription, with frequent threats and often the reality of violence. There was a shocking massacre at Hamburg. Governor Chamberlain called on the President for aid, and a thousand troops were sent into the State. When the ...
— The Negro and the Nation - A History of American Slavery and Enfranchisement • George S. Merriam

... of means for military purposes which might be construed into an act of hostility. To meet this scruple it was suggested that the grant might be made for the purpose of encouraging and protecting all settlers on the waters of the Mississippi. And under this specious plea ten thousand pounds were grudgingly voted; but ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving

... me. I owed him, oh unmistakeably, certain noble conceptions; I had lighted my little taper at his smoky lamp, and lo it continued to twinkle. But the light it gave me just showed me how much more I wanted. I was pursued of course by letters from Mrs. Saltram which I didn't scruple not to read, though quite aware her embarrassments couldn't but be now of the gravest. I sacrificed to propriety by simply putting them away, and this is how, one day as my absence drew to an end, my eye, while I rummaged in my desk for another paper, was ...
— The Coxon Fund • Henry James

... often has he, I well know, for a purse well filled with gold, prepared the sleep of death. Another would shudder at the thought; but he, who has dealt out death at the will of his employers, would scruple little to do so even to the husband of his own daughter; and I have watched him in his moods, and know his thoughts and wishes. What a foreboding of mishap has come over me this evening!—what a fear of evil! Philip is ill, 'tis true, but not so ...
— The Phantom Ship • Captain Frederick Marryat

... "gentlemen's stories" only. As for the grim Squire, for whom alone the narrative had been served and garnished, at so very short a notice, he observed upon it, that "when he had used up old Byam's brains he should now have the less scruple in turning him out-of-doors, inasmuch as it seemed there was a profession in town that ...
— Bred in the Bone • James Payn

... said Frank; "but still, if you have any scruple, don't drink it; I bekaise the truth is, Art, you couldn't have a scruple that will do you more good than one ...
— Phelim O'toole's Courtship and Other Stories • William Carleton

... heart!" cried the impetuous prince. "Since you quitted me, six months ago, my dear Gonzaga, I have known nothing but cares! To you I have no scruple in avowing, that my position in this country is hateful. So long accustomed to war against a barbarous enemy, I could almost fancy myself as much a Moor at heart, as I appeared in visage, when in your service ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various

... sufficient perception of the privileges which chivalry gives them, but no perception of that return which chivalry demands from them. Women of the class to which I allude are always talking of their rights, but seem to have a most indifferent idea of their duties. They have no scruple at demanding from men everything that a man can be called on to relinquish in a woman's behalf, but they do so without any of that grace which turns the demand made into a ...
— Volume 1 • Anthony Trollope

... if possible. The Tehuas would reap many scalps; she would have had her revenge; and the deed could be so performed as to make those at the Rito believe that the Navajos were the perpetrators. This was her plan, and she did not feel the slightest scruple or compunction. For years she had been, among her own people, the butt of numberless insults and mortifications. Now it had gone so far that her life even was in imminent peril. Ere this should be lost, she would prove to her enemies that she was ...
— The Delight Makers • Adolf Bandelier

... "Do not scruple to refuse me," she said, "if you do not approve. I hardly venture to hope that you will give your consent. If you do, I will thank you for it. If you should think it best to refuse it, I submit humbly as I submit now. Let me add that I would not ask the favor but that my health and strength ...
— Wife in Name Only • Charlotte M. Braeme (Bertha M. Clay)

... Any scruple on the girl's part will be relentlessly and carelessly brushed aside as a bothersome insect. If she persists, there is always force. He fears nothing from me. I am a foreigner—from his standpoint too crudely frank to ...
— The Lady and Sada San - A Sequel to The Lady of the Decoration • Frances Little

... every scruple far into the shade. If Barbara had kept her troth to him, he would reward her. Wherever he might build his nest with her, he would be sure of the richest happiness. Therefore he persisted in making his decision for the future depend upon ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... circumstance otherwise so prejudicial to directly inductive inquiry, hardly affords, in this case, additional reason of regret. For even if we could try experiments upon a nation or upon the human race, with as little scruple as M. Magendie tried them on dogs and rabbits, we should never succeed in making two instances identical in every respect except the presence or absence of some one definite circumstance. The nearest approach ...
— A System Of Logic, Ratiocinative And Inductive • John Stuart Mill

... receiving a great number of people; thither Jonathan went in, and though he durst not openly speak of a revolt, yet did he say that their city stood in need of a better governor than it then had. But Jesus, who was the ruler, made no scruple to speak out, and said openly, "O fellow citizens! it is better for you to be in subjection to four than to one; and those such as are of high birth, and not without reputation for their wisdom;" and pointed to Jonathan ...
— The Life of Flavius Josephus • Flavius Josephus

... scruple to avow his share in the preparations for the massacre of Saint Bartholomew. The Duchess of Nemours, her son Henri of Guise, and her brother-in-law the Duc d'Aumale were taken into their counsels, and the plan was ...
— Saint Bartholomew's Eve - A Tale of the Huguenot WarS • G. A. Henty

... well that no party in the State was prepared to sacrifice its own interests for his preservation. Standing at bay against his foes at home; deserted by those amongst whom he had once exercised supreme sway; betrayed by the treachery of Monk, who did not scruple to send to Scotland some compromising letters which involved Argyle in plots against the King, Argyle was at length reduced to one last resource. He knew the dominating influence of Clarendon, and he knew also that, although his enemy, Clarendon was not ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik

... him at his house. He explained very frankly that as I was the first foreigner who had ever stopped in Saigo, it would afford much pleasure both to his family and to himself to have a good chance to see me; but the natural courtesy of the man overcame any scruple I might have felt to gratify the curiosity of strangers. I was not only treated charmingly at his beautiful home, but actually sent away loaded with presents, most of which I attempted to decline in vain. In one matter, however, ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan • Lafcadio Hearn

... and if the end was to his liking, never hesitated about making a grand sacrifice to attain it)—her parents, I say, would have delivered Hannah over to his lovingkindness and his tender mercies without one scruple; and the second Mrs. Helstone, inverting the natural order of insect existence, would have fluttered through the honeymoon a bright, admired butterfly, and crawled the rest of her days a sordid, ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte

... complications in the Cape, Zululand, and the Transvaal: and indeed is little to be wondered at. But, whilst a large portion of the press has united with a powerful party of politicians in directing a continuous stream of abuse on to the heads of the white inhabitants of South Africa, whom they do not scruple to accuse of having created the recent disturbances in order to reap a money profit from them: it does not appear to have struck anybody that the real root of this crop of troubles might, after all, be growing nearer home. The truth of the matter is, that native and other ...
— Cetywayo and his White Neighbours - Remarks on Recent Events in Zululand, Natal, and the Transvaal • H. Rider Haggard

... plug-ugly of the woods. He looks like a tiny, immature house-fly, with white legs as if he must be innocent. But, in fact, he crawls like a serpent and bites like a dog. No portion of the human frame is sacred from his greed. He takes his pound of flesh anywhere, and does not scruple to take the blood with it. As a rule you can defend yourself, to some degree, against him, by wearing a head-net, tying your sleeves around your wrists and your trousers around your ankles, and anointing yourself with grease, flavoured ...
— Little Rivers - A Book Of Essays In Profitable Idleness • Henry van Dyke

... but very fair English, and made no scruple about coming on board the schooner and examining ...
— The Ocean Cat's Paw - The Story of a Strange Cruise • George Manville Fenn

... said he, "that where your liberty is at stake you can allow any such scruple to deter ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... she only made him ashamed of the way she herself exercised it. But he bore his humiliation much better than his sister, for he was ready to take for granted that he should one day restore the balance. He was a canny and far-seeing youth, with appetites and aspirations, and he had not a scruple in his composition. His mother's theory of the happy knack he could pick up deprived him of the wholesome discipline required to prevent young idlers from becoming cads. He had, abroad, a casual tutor and a snatch or two of a Swiss ...
— Greville Fane • Henry James

... had evoked in the old warder's heart despite the number of criminals who had passed through his hands, he had been on the point of broaching a serious and delicate matter to him; but he had not actually spoken, being deterred by some undefinable scruple, as well as half suspecting that his application would be made in vain. And now he was glad he had been so cautious, for even if the warder had been amenable, his approaching removal to another prison would have prevented the idea from ...
— Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre

... discouraged the hope of anything like reading from him; she even feigned that he might not like to do it without consulting Mr. Godolphin, and if she did not live a lie concerning the status of his play, she did not scruple to ...
— The Story of a Play - A Novel • W. D. Howells

... to live upon nothing? I asked papa whether he couldn't get it done; but he said it would be a money bill, and that you ought to take it up. Pray don't, for fear it should take you all August. I know you wouldn't have a scruple about putting off your own little affair, if anything of that kind were to come in the way. I ...
— Marion Fay • Anthony Trollope

... to prevent the ruin of some gambler by whose folly he would himself have profited. His constant charity was well known; the money so lightly come by was at the disposal of any one who could prefer a piteous tale. Moreover he made no scruple about exacting from others that charity which they could well afford. One may easily guess who was the duchess mentioned in the following story of ...
— Goldsmith - English Men of Letters Series • William Black

... than use his opportunities skilfully. Why not abuse the gentry who buy copper to catch the rise of the market? Why not abuse the whole of the thousands of men who make the City lively for six days of the week? Is there any rational man breathing who would scruple to accept profit from the rise of a stock or share? If I, practically, back South-Eastern Railway shares to rise, who blames me if I sell when my property has increased in value by one-eighth? My good counsellor, Mr. Ruskin, who is the ...
— The Ethics of Drink and Other Social Questions - Joints In Our Social Armour • James Runciman

... then devoted his attention to seating her, placed under her feet cushions and carpets of cashmere (for he had only this material about him). Even his clothing and bed-coverings were of an exceedingly fine quality of cashmere. Asker-Khan did not scruple to wash his face, his beard, and hands in the presence of everybody, seating himself for this operation in front of a slave, who presented to him on ...
— The Private Life of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Constant

... recommended conciliatory measures, but likewise denounced the war as monstrous; it was but natural that throughout the nation at large there should be many private individuals cherishing similar sentiments, and some who made no scruple clandestinely to ...
— Israel Potter • Herman Melville

... of a reply, and greeted Fanny, as of old times, on the steamer; but Mrs. Vanderburgh went on, all smiles and eagerness—so rapidly in her friendly intentions, that it boded ill for the future peace of Mr. King's party. So Mr. King broke into the torrent of words at once, without any more scruple. "And now, Mrs. Vanderburgh, if you will excuse us, we are quite tired, and are going to our rooms." And he bowed himself off, and of course his family followed; the next moment Fanny ...
— Five Little Peppers Abroad • Margaret Sidney

... gents who read this, may call me a poor-spirited fellow for allowing my wife to go out to service, who was bred a lady and ought to have servants herself: yet, for my part, I confess I did not feel one minute's scruple or mortification on the subject. If you love a person, is it not a pleasure to feel obliged to him? And this, in consequence, I felt. I was proud and happy at being able to think that my dear wife should be able to labour and earn bread for me, now misfortune had put it out of ...
— The History of Samuel Titmarsh - and the Great Hoggarty Diamond • William Makepeace Thackeray

... always had a little private hankering after Athens, though he ridicules it. He had no scruple about annexing Athens, although not yet taken. I said I thought Polignac would be disposed to hold our language to Russia, if we would make some concession on the subject of Greece, and enable him to settle that question with eclat. He would then be supported ...
— A Political Diary 1828-1830, Volume II • Edward Law (Lord Ellenborough)

... three days ago, and have no reply. Who will help Prosper if his best friends desert him? If you don't answer this letter, I shall consider myself released from a certain promise, and without scruple will tell Prosper of the conversation I overheard between you and M. de Clameran. But I can count on you, can I not? I shall expect you at the Archangel day after ...
— File No. 113 • Emile Gaboriau

... of our poems, and, if possible, to get them printed. Averse to personal publicity, we veiled our own names under those of Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell; the ambiguous choice being dictated by a sort of conscientious scruple at assuming Christian names positively masculine, while we did not like to declare ourselves women, because—without at that time suspecting that our mode of writing and thinking was not what is called 'feminine'—we had a vague impression that authoresses are liable ...
— Charlotte Bronte's Notes on the pseudonyms used • Charlotte Bronte

... but, lifting the latch noisily, pressed against the door. It was fast. And now the moaning suddenly became louder. Without a thought, without a scruple, he promptly thrust his toe against the foot of the door and pressed heavily. Then, lifting the latch, he threw all the weight of his powerful shoulder against the lock. The door gave before him, nearly precipitating him headlong into ...
— The One-Way Trail - A story of the cattle country • Ridgwell Cullum

... chest, in hoarded heaps, Can Gold, my SALLUST, one true joy bestow, Where sullen, dim, and valueless it sleeps, Whose worth, whose charms, from circulation flow? Ah! then it shines attractive on the thought, Rises, with such resistless influence fraught As puts to flight pale Fear, and Scruple cold, Till Life, e'en Life itself, ...
— Original sonnets on various subjects; and odes paraphrased from Horace • Anna Seward

... probation.[1713] Repairing to the flight of steps constituted by Righteousness, do thou ascend those steps one after another. At present thou art like a worm that is employed in weaving its cocoon round itself and thereby depriving itself of all means of escape. Do thou keep to thy left, without any scruple, the atheist who transgresses all restraints, who is situated like a house by the side of a fierce and encroaching current, (for the destruction he courts), and who (to others) seems to stand like a bamboo with its tall head erected ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown

... bold behavior, issuing immediately in the festive popping of guns at a wedding and a hearty charivari thereafter; and those soft devices to which pretty Peggy Lacey should have resorted without scruple in her own relief, were not unknown, you may be sure, to the wise, whispering maids of the place. It was too complacently agreed that the situation, being left to the direction and mastery of Time, would proceed to a happy conclusion ...
— Harbor Tales Down North - With an Appreciation by Wilfred T. Grenfell, M.D. • Norman Duncan

... foregoing remarks follow very closely Symonds' treatment in the third chapter of his Italian Literature. In point of fact, I lit on Donati's poem quite accidentally, before reading the chapter in question, but I have made no scruple of availing myself of his guidance wherever it was to ...
— Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama - A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration - Stage in England • Walter W. Greg

... show you," said Miss Burgoyne, making no scruple about preceding her visitors along the corridor and up the steps, for she had ...
— Prince Fortunatus • William Black

... he would have blindly tried for anything he could get, in any possible way. But, as she was?... He felt convinced he could never succeed in making her care for him; there was not the slightest chance of it. And, supposing even that he could? And here came in the delicacy and scruple of the man who had been married himself. He thought he wouldn't even wish to spoil, by the vulgarity of compromising, or by the shadow of a secret, the serenity of her face, the gay prettiness of that life. No, he wouldn't if ...
— Tenterhooks • Ada Leverson

... Miss Glover to see if she had made good use of the opportunity given her for ridding herself of the jewel by dropping it into the caldron. If she had, both her troubles and mine were at an end; if she had not, then I need feel no further scruple in approaching her with the direct question I had hitherto found it so difficult ...
— Room Number 3 - and Other Detective Stories • Anna Katharine Green

... kind then; there are more than enough of them still loitering about the Courts, civil and criminal. San Francisco is not the only city in the United States in which defendants in grave criminal cases have recourse to every conceivable and possible means, without scruple, to procure their own acquittal, or the utmost modification of the penalty, by proving extenuating circumstances, or that the indictment magnifies the crimes. This was true of 1856; here, as elsewhere in the land; it is equally true now. Had the merchants and solid citizens then drawn ...
— The Vigilance Committee of '56 • James O'Meara

... as pale as Kate herself, and she did not scruple to turn upon her departing guest a glance both regretful and forbidding. Kate looked across the breakfast-table at ...
— The Precipice • Elia Wilkinson Peattie

... thou less nor more, But just a pound of flesh; if thou tak'st more, Or less, than just a pound,—be it so much As makes it light, or heavy, in the substance, Or the division of the twentieth part Of one poor scruple,—nay, if the scale do turn But in the estimation of a hair,— Thou diest, and all thy ...
— The Canadian Elocutionist • Anna Kelsey Howard

... questions, like the similar question about the Iliad and the Odyssey, which are worth asking, but which cannot have a distinct answer. In the age of Plato there was no regular mode of publication, and an author would have the less scruple in altering or adding to a work which was known only to a few of his friends. There is no absurdity in supposing that he may have laid his labours aside for a time, or turned from one work to another; and such interruptions would be more likely to occur in the case of a long ...
— The Republic • Plato

... provide for the expenses of the District Courts while enforcing the Territorial laws. The grand juries refuse to find indictments. The traverse juries refuse to convict Mormons. The witnesses perjure themselves without scruple and without exception. The unruly crowd of camp-followers, which is the inseparable attendant of an army, has concentrated in Salt Lake City, and is in constant contact and conflict with the Mormon population. An apprehension ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, No. 19, May, 1859 • Various

... services' approach to equal opportunity and treatment during the Eisenhower administration. The President showed a strong reluctance to interfere with local laws and customs, a reluctance that seemed to flow out of a pronounced constitutional scruple against federal intervention in defiance of local racial laws. The practical consequence of this scruple was readily apparent in the armed forces throughout his administration. In 1955, for example, a black veteran ...
— Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940-1965 • Morris J. MacGregor Jr.

... seat in her carriage, on the understanding that I was going to Lausanne, where she intended to stop a day or two. An offer of the kind made by so elegant and fascinating a woman you may be assured I did not scruple to accept, and I was in hopes of improving on this acquaintance and renewing it at Milan. Indeed, did not business oblige me to remain some weeks at Lausanne, I should certainly offer my services to escort her all the way to ...
— After Waterloo: Reminiscences of European Travel 1815-1819 • Major W. E Frye

... held by nothing except a court of law. For years the word "China" has meant to the adventurers of other lands a place for exploitation, a place where silver was to be obtained by the man with fluent tongue and winning ways. Even foreign officials did not scruple to use their influence ...
— My Lady of the Chinese Courtyard • Elizabeth Cooper

... improvements only escaped similar punishment when the ingenuity of priests attributed them to the special favor of some particular deity. This feeling has not even yet quite died out. Even I can remember the time when many excellent persons had a scruple or prejudice against the use of chloroform, because they fancied that pain ...
— The Pleasures of Life • Sir John Lubbock

... weakened if you would imagine them on right lines before you have to go through them. Why do you wait helplessly until you meet them in the physical world. If you thought of your coming trouble in the morning, and thought of yourself as acting perfectly in the midst of it (you should never scruple to imagine yourself perfect), when the thing turned up in the day, it would have lost its power, and you would no longer feel the sting to the same extent. Now each of you must have in your life something that troubles you. Think of yourself as facing that trouble ...
— An Introduction to Yoga • Annie Besant

... marriage with herself would endow her with wealth sufficient to make that rank splendid as well as illustrious? But if it were not so, what had the girl meant by saying that it was impossible? That the word should have been used once or twice in maidenly scruple, the Countess could understand; but it had been repeated with a vehemence beyond that which such natural timidity might have produced. And now the girl professed herself to be ill in bed, and when the subject was broached would only weep, and repeat ...
— Lady Anna • Anthony Trollope

... reckless promoters and denizens of the underworld. Sometimes amongst those who would fan the embers of social discontent into a blaze that would destroy society and not infrequently in the ranks of those who would not scruple to plunder the public treasury. It has always been annoying and disconcerting to such elements to find that they could neither cajole nor frighten nor bribe these inflexible men in the uniform of scarlet and gold who stood for the administration of British law in a British country. Noblesse oblige. ...
— Policing the Plains - Being the Real-Life Record of the Famous North-West Mounted Police • R.G. MacBeth

... in one day, so great was the curiosity of the public in that particular. Afterwards too in the Post-Boy of January 17, 1718-19, he published an Advertisement to justify his character against a report that had been spread to his disadvantage: and he did not scruple to declare in all companies that his life was attempted by his enemies, or otherwise he should have attended his feat in the Irish Parliament. His behaviour, about this time, made many of his friends judge he was become delirious; his passions were certainly exceeding ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753),Vol. V. • Theophilus Cibber

... rebel, His neck is forfeit. Can he save himself At thy cost, think you he will scruple it? And if they put him to the torture, will he, Will he, that dastardling, have ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. III • Kuno Francke (Editor-in-Chief)

... such were needed, that our party and the yacht have somehow incurred the very gravest suspicion of the Spaniards, and that we are being most jealously watched. I fear that Carlos and I are chiefly responsible for this; indeed, the agent here did not scruple to say that we—Carlos and I—committed a very great tactical blunder in coming out here in the yacht. He asserts that we ought to have come out in the ordinary way by mail steamer, and that in such a case little or no suspicion would have attached to the yacht; but ...
— The Cruise of the Thetis - A Tale of the Cuban Insurrection • Harry Collingwood

... the authorities upon himself; but neither in Paris nor in Rome was he, the pupil of Rene and of Trophana, convicted of guilt. All the same, though proof was wanting, his enormities were so well accredited that there was no scruple as to having him arrested. A warrant was out against him: Exili was taken up, and was lodged in the Bastille. He had been there about six months when Sainte-Croix was brought to the same place. The prisoners were numerous ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE

... assembly did not scruple to use this pressure of public opinion, of popular violence, for all it was worth. And placed as they were it was not surprising that they should have done so. The deputies were only a small group of men in the great royal ...
— The French Revolution - A Short History • R. M. Johnston

... enthusiasm,' as Shaftesbury would have called it, took a mild and harmless form in New England: there the work in hand was not the break-up of a social system, but only the mental evolution of new ideals, the struggle of an ethical revival, and the satisfaction of a livelier spirit of scruple. In face of all delirations, Emerson kept on his way of radiant sanity and perfect poise. Do not, he warned his enthusiasts, expend all energy on some accidental evil, and so lose sanity and power of benefit. ...
— Critical Miscellanies, Vol. 1, Essay 5, Emerson • John Morley

... University of Leyden, and was celebrated for the extent and depth of his erudition. He wrote a defense of Charles I. of England, which was answered by Milton, in a work entitled "A Defense of the English People against Salmasius' Defense of the King." Salmasius died soon after, and some did not scruple to say that Milton killed him by the acuteness of ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta

... public excitement consequent upon the general election has been the revelation of some of the most grotesque vagaries of Protestantism that have ever come under our notice. One clergyman told his parishioners not to scruple about telling lies as to the party for which they intended to vote. Another characterized the Liberals as "a set of devils." Archdeacon Denison, an octogenarian ecclesiastic, informed his audience at ...
— Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 2, February 1886 • Various

... the conversation between her cousin and Lady Stafford rankles in her mind. What a foolish freak it was her ever permitting Marcia to think of her as one altogether without education! Instinct might have told that her cousin would not scruple about applying such knowledge to her disadvantage. And yet why is Marcia her enemy? How has she ever injured her? With what purpose does she seek to make her visit unpleasant ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton

... peremptory in ordering me not to overtask my eyes—forbidding reading and writing, as I have already mentioned. But, when I asked for his reasons, he had, for the first time in my experience of him, no reasons to give. I have the less scruple about disobeying him, on that account. Still I am a little uneasy, I confess, when I think of his strange behavior yesterday. He looked at me, in the oddest way—as if he saw something in my face which he had never seen before. Twice he took his leave; and twice he returned, doubtful ...
— Poor Miss Finch • Wilkie Collins

... guard, for if his side, which was always that of the English against the French, should chance to be defeated, there would be trouble in Baxter's Place. For these opinions he may almost be said to have suffered. Baptised and brought up in the Church of Scotland, he had, upon some conscientious scruple, joined the communion of the Baptists. Like other Nonconformists, these were inclined to the Liberal side in politics, and, at least in the beginning, regarded Buonaparte as a deliverer. From the time of his joining the Spearmen, Thomas Smith became in consequence ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 16 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... ignores the second necessary principle; a man must stop short of murder. If he turns gangman and killer, he ties his own rope around his neck. If a man like Galloway, a man with brains, power, without fear, without scruple, should decide to loot this corner of the world or any other corner, and set about it right, playing the lone hand invariably, he would be a man I couldn't bring in in a thousand years. But Galloway has slipped up; he has too many Moragas and Antones and Vidals at his ...
— The Bells of San Juan • Jackson Gregory

... endeavour. Though he would have advised others that by God's mercy all sorrows in this world could be cured, he told himself,—without arraigning God's mercy,—that for him this sorrow could not be cured. He did not scruple, therefore, to assure his brother that he would not marry,—nor did he hesitate, in writing to Patience Underwood, to assure her that his love for her sister was unchangeable. In saying so he urged no suit;—but it was impossible that he should ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope

... acquired a good deal of knowledge regarding the various musical instruments in use at that time. In other respects, too, his education was looked after; and as his quickness at learning was remarkable, and his cousin did not scruple to employ physical force to enable his pupil to master his difficulties, Joseph made rapid progress, despite the fact that he was often flogged when he should have been fed. The strict discipline to which he was subjected may not have been without its value in inducing ...
— Story-Lives of Great Musicians • Francis Jameson Rowbotham

... scarcely believe that no notice would have been taken of it by the authorities, civil or military. This made my capture the more surprising, for while I did not doubt that Vetch, if he had heard of my coming, would not scruple to lay by the heels one who had defeated him in his former design on Mistress Lucy. I was at a loss to understand how the identity of his visitor could have become known ...
— Humphrey Bold - A Story of the Times of Benbow • Herbert Strang

... withheld me from visiting the convent which formed a principal attraction to the military and other strangers in Kilkenny. Many sought to draw me thither, adducing the examples of Christian ministers and other spiritual people, who did not scruple to go; but in vain. At length a lady came to me with an earnest request from "the most interesting nun in the establishment," to give her some information on the best mode of conveying instruction to a poor little girl in their school, deaf and ...
— Personal Recollections • Charlotte Elizabeth

... spaces upon spaces, stars beyond stars, worlds beyond worlds, is a true expression of the Infinite Being. Does it follow, because the universe has no limits,—that it must therefore be eternal, immense, infinite as God himself? No; that is but a vain scruple, which springs from the imagination, and not from the reason. The imagination is always confounding what reason should ever distinguish, eternity and time, immensity and space, relative infinity and absolute infinity. The Creator alone is ...
— Christianity and Greek Philosophy • Benjamin Franklin Cocker

... preferring it so, and seated herself again by the window to repeat the last Aves. When she had finished, a scruple assailed her, and a fear lest she had erred in the reckoning, because it had not always been possible to count the beads of her rosary. Out of prudence she recited yet another fifty and then was silent-jaded, weary, but full of ...
— Maria Chapdelaine - A Tale of the Lake St. John Country • Louis Hemon

... men. There is a certain satisfaction in coming down to the lowest ground of politics, for we get rid of cant and hypocrisy. Bonaparte wrought, in common with that great class he represented, for power and wealth,—but Bonaparte, specially, without any scruple as to the means. All the sentiments which embarrass men's pursuit of these objects, he set aside. The sentiments were for women and children. Fontanes, in 1804, expressed Napoleon's own sense, when, in behalf of the Senate, he addressed him,—"Sire, the desire ...
— Representative Men • Ralph Waldo Emerson

... began to take part with their brothers and sweethearts. Those who had no bachelors among the opposite factions, fought along with their brothers; others did not scruple even to assist in giving their enamored swains the father of a good beating. Many, however, were more faithful to love than to natural affection, and these sallied out, like heroines, under the banners of their sweethearts, fighting with amazing prowess against their friends and ...
— The Ned M'Keown Stories - Traits And Stories Of The Irish Peasantry, The Works of - William Carleton, Volume Three • William Carleton

... one such, do, for heaven's sake, open your eyes to your gross ignorance and low propensities or be not surprised if one day you find yourself face to face with some powerful scoundrel who would not scruple to crush you in all possible ways. "Harm watch, harm catch." I am going to give you in practical form what constitute the real cause at the back of a "Magnetic" personality—that which when developed makes a god-like man of ...
— The Doctrine and Practice of Yoga • A. P. Mukerji

... make use of this flower, mingling its golden tincture with almost everything they eat. But, an excessive use of Saffron proves harmful. It will produce an intense pain in the head, and imperil the reason. Half-a-scruple, i.e., ten grains, should be the largest dose. In fuller doses this tincture will provoke a determination of blood to the head, with bleeding from the nose, and sometimes with a disposition to immoderate laughter. Small doses, therefore, of the diluted tincture, ...
— Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure • William Thomas Fernie

... beginning; there is hope for you yet; you will not tell a lie to save your dearest friend's soul, but you will spew out one without a scruple to save yourself the discomfort of ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... interests, than to receive helps from any other to resist them, almost upon any terms."—Clanric. 33, 34. There is in the collection of letters by Carte, one from Ormond to Clanricard written after the battle of Worcester, in which that nobleman says that it will be without scruple his advice, that "fitting ministers be sent to the pope, and apt inducements proposed to him for his interposition, not only with all princes and states". The rest of the letter is lost, or Carte did not choose to publish it; but it is plain from the first part ...
— The History of England from the First Invasion by the Romans - to the Accession of King George the Fifth - Volume 8 • John Lingard and Hilaire Belloc

... keeping them there during the night. As a dentifrice it is used in many parts of the world. We have had an opportunity of witnessing this fact in various parts of South America, but especially in Brazil, where respectable women do not scruple openly to use tobacco for this purpose. We have known several very respectable individuals of both sexes in our own country, who use snuff as a tooth powder, and with them its employment was just as much a habit as any ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various

... dared to fill the sees of Liege and Milan may not scruple to dishonor the see of Cologne! But let us pray and hope; for suffer what we may, we cannot ...
— The Truce of God - A Tale of the Eleventh Century • George Henry Miles

... Partly from a scruple of delicacy—which I daresay came too late—partly from the pleasure of startling an acquaintance, I desired to make my presence known to ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 4 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson



Words linked to "Scruple" :   question, apothecaries' unit, fret, anxiety, grain, fuss, niggle, qualm, dram, pause



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