Definition of "scruple" [scru•ple]

• An uneasy feeling arising from conscience or principle that tends to hinder action. See Synonyms at qualm. (noun)
• A unit of apothecary weight equal to about 1.3 grams, or 20 grains. (noun)
• A minute part or amount. (noun)
• To hesitate as a result of conscience or principle: "A man who could make so vile a pun would not scruple to pick a pocket” ( John Dennis). (verb-intransitive)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "It's interesting to note that the term "scruple" had at least three different definitions—and not all were for weight."
• "This absurd scruple is expressed almost in the same words by the continuator of"
• "Probole, or Prolatio, which the most orthodox divines borrowed without scruple from the Valentinians, and illustrated by the comparisons of a fountain and stream, the sun and its rays,"