subterfuge

subterfuge is defined in Webster's Unabridged Dictionary (1913) with 1 sense. The full text of each entry is reproduced verbatim below.

Definitions

  1. 1.That to which one resorts for escape or concealment; an artifice employed to escape censure or the force of an argument, or to justify opinions or conduct; a shift; an evasion. Affect not little shifts and subterfuges, to avoid the force of an argument. I. Watts. By a miserable subterfuge, they hope to render this position safe by rendering it nugatory. Burke.

Source: Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913 edition (public domain, via GCIDE / Project Gutenberg).

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