Forms: α. 4 sotilti, sutil(l)te, suttilte, 4–5 sotelte(e, -ilte(e, -ylte(e, sutelte(e, 4–6 soteltie, 5 -ty, -ellte, sutiltee, sutteltee, 5–6 sotyltie, suttelte, 5–7 suttletie, -ty, 6 sotiltie, -tye, sottelte, souttiltey, sutteltie, suttlete, suttylt(e)y, -ie. β. 5–6 subtelte, 6 -tie, 6–7 subtletie, 6– subtlety. [a. OF: su-, soutilte:—L. subtīlitās, -ātem, n. of quality f. subtīlis SUBTLE. The spelling was latinized in the 16th c. like that of subtle. Cf. SUBTILITY, SUBTILTY.]
1. Of persons, the mind, its faculties or operations: Acuteness, sagacity, penetration: in modern use chiefly with implication of delicate or keen perception of fine distinctions or nice points.
α. c. 1340. Richard Rolle of Hampole, Prick of Conscience, 5903. Gudes of grace may þir be, Mynde, and witte, and sutilte.
1422. Yonge, trans. Secreta Secret., vi. 134. What aualyth Sotilte of vndyrstondynge and connynge?
1538. Starkey, England, I. iv. 116. Ther ys nothyng so true and manyfest, but the suttylty of mannys reson may deuyse somethyng to say contrary.
β. c. 1400. Rom. Rose, 7471. Who so that hath hadde the subtelte The double sentence for to se.
1553. Eden, Treat. Newe Ind. (Arb.), 24. They greatly excel all other men in subteltie of wit and knowledge.
1597. Hooker, Eccl. Pol., V. lxvii. (1611), 363. They labour … by subtletie of wit to make some shew of agreement.
1638–56. Cowley, Davideis, III. note, 32. Some with much subilety, and some probability, understand a Pillar of Salt, to signifie only an Everlasting Pillar, of what matter soever.
1780. Harris, Philol. Enq., Wks. (1841), 508. Though that subtlety might sometimes have led them into refinements rather frivolous, yet have they given eminent samples of penetrating ingenuity.
1855. Macaulay, Hist. Eng., xiv. III. 409. Wit, taste, amplitude of comprehension, subtlety in drawing distinctions.
1872. Minto, Engl. Prose Lit., I. i. 47. His subtlety in distinguishing wherein things agree and wherein they differ.
† 2. Skill, cleverness, dexterity. Obs.
c. 1375. Sc. Leg. Saints, xi. (Symon & Iudas), 271. A kyste þat wrocht is all with costlyke wark & sutelte.
c. 1400. Destr. Troy, 8395. Miche soteltie, for-sothe, settyng of notes, Crafte þat was coynt, knawyng of tymes.
3. Craftiness, cunning, esp. of a treacherous kind; guile, treachery.
α. 1375. Barbour, Bruce, I. 172. Throuch gret sutelte and ghyle,… He was arestyt syne and tane.
c. 1394. P. Pl. Crede, 56. Ȝet seyn they in here sutilte to sottes in townes, Þei comen out of Carmeli Crist for to followen.
c. 1410. Hoccleve, Mother of God, 46. Lest our fo, the feend, thurgh his sotiltee,… Me ouercome with his treecherie.
1456. Sir G. Haye, Law Arms (S.T.S.), 18. To wirk with suteltee of ypocrisy.
1526. Tindale, Matt. xxvi. 4. The chefe prestes … heelde a counsell, howe they mygt take Jesus by suttelte, and kyll him.
1577. Grange, Golden Aphrod., G iv. She turned him for his suttlety in stealyng the same into a wylie Foxe.
1667. Milton, P. L., IX. 93. In the wilie Snake, Whatever sleights none would suspicious mark, As from his wit and native suttletie Proceeding.
β. 1532. Rom. Rose, 6172, in Chaucer’s Wks., 160 b/1. I dwell with hem that proude be And ful of wyles and subtelte.
1548–9. (Mar.) Bk. Com. Prayer, Litany, Those euyls, whiche the crafte and subteltie of the deuyll or man worketh against us.
1656. Bramhall, Reply S. W., 3. To observe with what subtlety this case is proposed, that the Church of England agreed with the Church of Rome.
1781. Gibbon, Decl. & F., xvii. II. (1787), 73. The laws were violated by power, or perverted by subtlety.
1821. Byron, Cain, III. i. Surely a father’s blessing may avert A reptile’s subtlety.
† 4. An ingenious contrivance; a crafty or cunning device; an artifice; freq. in unfavorable sense, a wily stratagem or trick, something craftily invented. Obs.
α. 1375. Barbour, Bruce, III. 611. Bot giff we fynd sum sutelte, Ourtane all sone sall we be.
c. 1380. Wyclif, Wks. (1880), 20. Bi false procurynge of matrymonye bi soteltees and queyntese.
c. 1420. Liber Cocorum (1862), 5. Anoþer sotelte I wylle telle. Take harpe strynges made of bowel [etc.].
c. 1450. Bk. Curtasye, 758, in Babees Bk. Yf þo syluer dysshe wylle algate brenne, A sotelte I wylle þe kenne.
1545[?]. Brinklow, Compl., vii. (1874), 20. How many gyles and suttylteys be there, to auoyde and escape the seruyng of the kyngs wrytt.
1671. Milton, Samson, 56. Liable to fall By weakest suttleties.
β. 1576. Turberv., Venerie, xxix. Let him marke the place where he hath fed, and whereon also to marke his subtleties and craftes.
1654. Bramhall, Just Vind., vii. (1661), 224. It hath been an old Subtlety of the Popes … to make the world believe that nothing could be done without them.
5. Cookery. A highly ornamental device, wholly or chiefly made of sugar, sometimes eaten, sometimes used as a table decoration. Obs. exc. Hist.
c. 1390[?]. Form of Cury, in Warner, Antiq. Culin. (1791), 4. It techith for to make curious potages and meetes, and sotiltees.
c. 1440. in Househ. Ord. (1790), 450. A soteltee Seint-jorge on horsebak, and sleynge the dragun.
1467–8. Durham Acc. Rolls (Surtees), 92. Pro le Tynfole empt. pro ornacione et pictura del soteltez erga festum Natal. Domini.
1517. Torkington, Pilgr. (1884), 7. They mad vs goodly Chere wt Diverse Sotylties as Comfytes and Marche Panys.
1552. Latimer, Serm. Par. King (Parker Soc.), II. 139. At the end of the dinner they have certain subtleties, custards, sweet and delicate things.
[1768. H. Walpole, Lett. to Cole, 6 June. I am no culinary antiquary: the Bishop of Carlisle, who is, I have often heard talk of a sotelte [printed sotelle], as an ancient dish.
1852. Miss Yonge, Cameos, II. xxxi. (1877), 327. The feast was entirely of fish: but they were of many kinds, and were adorned in the quaintest fashions, with sotilties, or subtleties.
1875. Jeaffreson, Bk. Table, I. 133. A subtlety, representing a pelican on a nest with her birds.]
† 6. Abstruseness, complexity, intricacy; also pl., abstruse or intricate matters. Obs.
13[?]. Seuyn Sag. (W.), 48. I wil that ye teche him euyn The sutelie of sience seuyn.
1387. Trevisa, trans. Higden (Rolls), I. 15. Nouȝt sotilte of sentence, noþer faire florischynge of wordes, but swetnesse of deuocion of þe matire schal regne in þis book.
c. 1407. Lydg., Reason & Sens., 1700. [Mercury] doth habounde In sotyltes ful profounde.
1535. Coverdale, Wisd. viii. 8. She knoweth ye sotilties of wordes, & can expounde darke sentences.
1591. Sparry, trans. Cattan’s Geomancie, A 4. The … suttletie of this Science.
7. A refinement or nicety of thought, speculation or argument; a fine distinction; a nice point.
1654. Bramhall, Just Vind., ii. (1661), 28. That prefers not a subtlety or an imaginary truth before the bond of peace.
a. 1680. Butler, Rem. (1759), II. 486. They that are curious in Subtleties, and ignorant in things of solid Knowledge.
1760. Sterne, Tr. Shandy, IV. xxix. My father delighted in subtleties of this kind.
1837. Whewell, Hist. Induct. Sci. (1857), I. 191. The … unprofitable subtleties of the schools.
1868. Milman, St. Paul’s, vi. 115. The lecturer had no logical subtleties.
1876. Freeman, Norm. Conq., V. xxiv. 369. [He] held that land as a plain matter of fact, and without any legal subtleties, as a personal gift from King William.
1903. Ld. Halsbury, in Law Rep., 1 K. B. Div. 413. By ingenious subtleties to bring within the grasp of the tax something which was not intended.
8. Thinness, tenuity, exility; penetrativeness arising from lack of density.
1691. Ray, Creation, I. (1704), 109. The subtlety, activity, and penetrancy of its effluvia.
1748. Hartley, Observ. Man, I. i. § 1. 24. Admitting the Existence and Subtlety of the Aether.
1779. Johnson, L. P., Cowley (1781), I. 31. Subtlety … in its original import means exility of particles.
1855. Brewster, Newton, I. vi. 146. I will suppose ether to consist of parts differing from one another in subtlety by indefinite degrees.
1893. Sir R. Ball, Story of Sun, 120. Such is the wondrous subtlety of the ethereal fluid.
9. Fineness or delicacy of nature, character, manner, operation, or the like; an instance of this.
1820. Hazlitt, Lect. Dram. Lit., 17. Religious controversy sharpens the understanding by the subtlety and remoteness of the topics it discusses.
1840. Carlyle, Heroes (1858), 204. Who knows to what unnameable subtleties of spiritual law all these Pagan Fables owe their shape!
1879. Swinburne, Stud. Shaks. (1880), 7. The delicate and infinite subtleties of change and growth discernible in the spirit and the speech of the greatest among poets.
1888. Bryce, Amer. Commw., cvii. III. 549. I doubt whether democracy tends to discourage originality, subtlety, refinement, in thought and in expression.
