reservation vs scruple

reservation

noun
  • A limiting qualification regarding certainty; a doubt. 

  • The area which separates opposing lanes of traffic on a divided motorway or dual carriageway; see also central reservation. 

  • The practice of reserving part of the consecrated bread of the Eucharist for the communion of the sick. 

  • Something that is withheld or kept back. 

  • An arrangement by which accommodation or transport arrangements are secured in advance. 

  • A power of an overseeing authority to suspend legislation in the jurisdiction being overseen pending the approval of a higher authority. Such as a provincial/state governor reserving a bill passed by the state/provincial legislature from assent, pending approval of the federal government; or a federal bill passed by federal parliament being reserved by the viceroy pending approval by the crown. 

  • A tract of land set apart by the US government for the use of a Native American people; Indian reservation (compare Canadian reserve). 

  • The act of reserving, withholding or keeping back. 

  • The act of the pope to reserve to himself the right to nominate to certain benefices. 

  • The setting aside of a certain percentage of vacancies in government institutions for members of backward and underrepresented communities (defined primarily by caste and tribe). 

scruple

noun
  • Hesitation to act from the difficulty of determining what is right or expedient; doubt, hesitation or unwillingness due to motives of conscience. 

  • A weight of ¹⁄₂₈₈ of a pound, that is, twenty grains or one third of a dram, about 1.3 grams (symbol: ℈). 

  • A Hebrew unit of time equal to ¹⁄₁₀₈₀ hour. 

verb
  • To excite scruples in; to cause to scruple. 

  • To hesitate or be reluctant to act due to considerations of conscience or expedience. 

  • To regard with suspicion; to question. 

How often have the words reservation and scruple occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )