scrupleyoudaoicibaDictYouDict[scruple 词源字典]
scruple: [16] Latin scrūpus meant ‘sharp stone’, and the notion of something troubling the mind like a painful stone in the shoe led to its metaphorical use for ‘anxiety, doubt, particularly over a moral issue’. Both meanings were carried over into the diminutive form scrūpulus, which also came to be used for a very small unit of weight. This passed into English via French scrupule as scruple, on the way losing the literal sense ‘small stone’.
[scruple etymology, scruple origin, 英语词源]
scruple (v.)youdaoicibaDictYouDict
"to have or make scruples," 1620s, from scruple (n.). Related: Scrupled; scrupling.
scruple (n.)youdaoicibaDictYouDict
"moral misgiving, pang of conscience," late 14c., from Old French scrupule (14c.), from Latin scrupulus "uneasiness, anxiety, pricking of conscience," literally "small sharp stone," diminutive of scrupus "sharp stone or pebble," used figuratively by Cicero for a cause of uneasiness or anxiety, probably from the notion of having a pebble in one's shoe. The word in the more literal Latin sense of "small unit of weight or measurement" is attested in English from late 14c.