▪ I. confidence, n.
(ˈkɒnfɪdəns)
Also 5 -ens.
[ad. L. confīdentia, n. of quality or state f. confīdent-em: see confident and -ence. Cf. F. confidence (14th c. in Oresme), but some of the senses are not found in F. (where they are expressed by confiance).]
1. The mental attitude of trusting in or relying on a person or thing; firm trust, reliance, faith. Const. in († to, on, upon).
| c 1430 Lydg. in Pol. Rel. & L. Poems 47 Alle verteu..Made stable in god by gostly confidence. 1490 Caxton Eneydos xxv. 93 The whiche goddes, hauynge confydence in trustynge his sayd promysse. 1535 Coverdale Ps. cxvii. 9 It is better to trust in the Lorde, then to put eny confidence in man. 1557 North tr. Gueuara's Diall Pr. 133 b/1 The sonne..will not haue to his father any great confidence. 1593 Shakes. Rich. II, ii. iv. 6 The King reposeth all his confidence in thee. 1649 Bp. Reynolds Hosea iv. 48 Confidence..in foraigne ayde. 1774 Goldsm. Grecian Hist. I. 310 The king would place more confidence in the engagements of the nobility than upon those of the..capricious multitude. 1837 Baroness Bunsen in Hare Life I. x. 448 He..never abused the most implicit confidence. |
2. a. The feeling sure or certain of a fact or issue; assurance, certitude; assured expectation.
| 1555 Eden Decades iii. iii. 104 They..with no lesse confydence licke their lippes secreately in hope of their praye. 1611 Shakes. Wint. T. i. ii. 414 He thinkes, nay with all confidence he sweares, As he had seen't. a 1698 Temple Ess. Heroic Virtue Wks. 1731 I. 230 The very Confidence of Victory..makes Armies victorious. 1790 Beatson Nav. & Mil. Mem. I. 209 Wrapped up in a vain confidence of his own abilities. 1872 Freeman Hist. Ess. (ed. 3) 12 This story..I affirm with less confidence. |
† b. Const. to do. Obs.
| 1667 Milton P.L. vi. 343 Humbl'd by such rebuke, so farr beneath His confidence to equal God in power. |
† c. in, on, upon confidence (of, that, to do).
| a 1600 Hooker Eccl. Pol. vi. v. §6 (1841) Not in confidence to redeem sin but as tokens of meek submission. 1651 Hobbes Leviath. ii. xvii. 88 Men agree to submit to some Man on confidence to be protected by him. 1654 H. L'Estrange Chas. I (1655) 51 In confidence thereof, the Duke left him. |
3. a. Assurance, boldness, fearlessness, arising from reliance (on oneself, on circumstances, on divine support, etc.).
| 1526 Pilgr. Perf. (W. de W. 1531) 17 b, By the holy loue of charite we may haue great confydence and meke boldnesse. 1526 Tindale Acts xxviii. 31 Preachyng the kyngdome of God..with all confidence [so 1611; 1881 Rev. boldness]. 1601 Shakes. Jul. C. ii. ii. 49 Alas my Lord, Your wisedome is consum'd in confidence: Do not go forth to day: Call it my feare. 1752 Johnson Rambler No. 194 ¶3 He..was able to address those whom he never saw before with ease and confidence. 1832 Irving Alhambra 367 At first she touched her lute with a faltering hand, but gathering confidence and animation as she proceeded, drew forth..soft aerial harmony. |
b. Const. to have c. to do (anything).
| 1535 Coverdale 1 Chron. xviii. [xvii]. 25 Therfore hath thy seruaunt founde (confydence) to make his prayer before the. 1705 Stanhope Paraphr. III. 436 Who can have the confidence to think himself excused, toward those of a differing Judgement. 1818 Jas. Mill Brit. India II. iv. v. 167 Conflans had no longer confidence to meet the English in the field. |
4. a. In a bad sense: Assurance based on insufficient or improper grounds; excess of assurance, overboldness, hardihood, presumption, impudence.
| 1594 Hooker Eccl. Pol. Ded. (J.), Their confidence, for the most part, riseth from too much credit given to their own wits. 1656 Jer. Taylor in Evelyn's Mem. (1857) III. 72 The confidence of men, who of themselves are apt enough to hide their vices in irreligion. 1667 Pepys Diary (1877) V. 56 My wife begun to complain to me of Willetts confidence in sitting cheek by jowl by us. 1694 R. Molesworth Acc. Denmark (ed. 3) C iij b, The French Ambassador had the Confidence to tear out of the Book of Mottos in the Kings Library, this Verse, which Mr. Sydney..had written in it. 1712 Steele Spect. No. 502 ¶2 The intolerable Folly and Confidence of Players putting in Words of their own. |
b. As an appellation: = Confident one.
| 1741 Richardson Pamela (1824) I. xxii. 272 Do I want you, confidence! Yes, I do. Where have you been these two hours, that you never came near me? |
5. An object or ground of trust; ‘that which gives confidence, boldness, or security’ (J.).
| 1535 Coverdale Job xxxi. 24 Or, haue I sayde to the fynest golde of all: thou art my confidence? 1611 Bible Prov. iii. 26 For the Lord shalbe thy confidence. |
6. The confiding of private or secret matters to another; the relation of intimacy or trust between persons so confiding; confidential intimacy.
(In the first three quots. some take confidence as a humorous blunder for conference.)
| 1592 Shakes. Rom. & Jul. ii. iv. 133, I desire some confidence with you. 1598 ― Merry W. i. iv. 172, I will tell your Worship more of the Wart, the next time we haue confidence. 1599 ― Much Ado iii. v. 3. 1613 ― Hen. VIII, i. ii. 167, With demure Confidence This pausingly ensu'de. 1632 Hayward tr. Biondi's Eromena 172 He telling [it] in confidence to a friend of his. 1709 Steele Tatler No. 52 ¶1 No one was in Confidence with her in carrying on this Treaty but the matchless Virgulta. 1725 De Foe Voy. round World (1840) 66 To see if he could pitch upon one man more likely than the rest, to enter into some confidence with. 1741 Middleton Cicero I. iv. 244 A citizen who lived afterwards in great confidence with Caesar. 1828 Scott F.M. Perth xv, I have possessed two or three tattling fools, in deep confidence, that, etc. 1875 Jowett Plato (ed. 2) III. 489 Speaking in confidence, for I should not like to have my words repeated. |
7. A confidential communication.
| 1748 Chesterfield Lett. II. clxiv. 100 He will..be well informed of all that passes..by the confidences made him. 1860 Sala Lady Chesterf. Pref. 3, I intended these Letters to be the confidences and counsels of a garrulous old woman of the world. 1870 Helps Ess., Secrecy 54 Before you make any confidence, you should consider whether the thing you wish to confide is of weight enough to be a secret. |
† 8. Trustworthiness, as a personal quality. a person of confidence: one entrusted with matters of importance or secrecy, a confidential agent. Cf. confident a. 6.
| 1642 Jer. Taylor Episc. (1647) 366 Bishops and Priests were men of great ability and surest confidence for determinations of justice. 1777 Robertson Hist. Amer. (1783) II. 223 He sent a person of confidence to the Havana, with..farther orders. 1791 Gentl. Mag. LXI. ii. 864 If your Lordship pleases, I will nominate a person of confidence. 1800 tr. Cervantes' Force of Blood 161 She sent a man of confidence to the priest. |
† 9. a. Law. = trust. Obs.
| 1536 Act 27 Hen. VIII, c. 10 Feoffments, fines, recoveries, and other like assurances to uses, confidences, and trusts.—Seised..of..lands..to the use, confidence, or trust of any other person or persons, or of any body politick. 1574 tr. Littleton's Tenures 97 a, Feoffments made uppon confidence to perfourme the will of the feoffour. 1628 Coke On Litt. 271 If a man enfeoffe other men of his land vpon confidence, and to the intent to performe his last will. 1767 Blackstone Comm. II. 332. 1848 Wharton Law Lex. 669/2 All matters of trust and confidence are exclusively cognizable in equity. |
b. Eccl. (See quot.)
| 1872 W. H. Jervis Gallican Ch. I. v. 212 note, A ‘confidence’ is a contract by which an ecclesiastic receives a benefice on condition of paying the emoluments, or a part of them, to a third person; or covenants to resign the preferment at a specified time. |
10. confidence trick (game, etc.): a method of professional swindling, in which the victim is induced to hand over money or other valuables as a token of ‘confidence’ in the sharper. confidence man: one who practises this trick; a professional swindler of respectable appearance and address. orig. U.S.
| 1849 New Orleans Picayune 21 June 1/4 ‘Well, then,’ continues the ‘confidence man’, ‘just lend me your watch till to-morrow.’ 1856 Spirit of Age (Sacramento, Calif.) 14 Mar. 4/1 G. W. Meylert's now about town, playing the confidence game and making grand attempts at swindling. 1866 E. A. Pollard Southern Hist. War II. xxv. 477 President Davis..was surrounded by adventurers and ‘confidence-men’. 1884 Boston (Mass.) Jrnl. 22 Nov. 6/5 For some weeks the newspapers here have waged a war of extermination against gamblers, confidence men, thieves and others of like ilk. 1884 Spectator 9 Feb. 182/2 We know of no social puzzle equal in perplexity to the continual success of the Confidence Trick. 1886 Century Mag. Feb. 512/2 [They are] Confidence sharps, young feller. 1887 W. S. Gilbert Ruddigore ii. 37 There's confidence tricking, bad coin, pocket-picking, And several other disgraces. 1887 Harper's Mag. Mar. 514/1 Bertha Heymann, ‘Queen of the confidence women’. 1909 Daily Chron. 13 Nov. 4/4 Confidence-tricksters would rather meet a fly-flat than the most learned of Oxford dons; and that is also why the smart Yankee is their most common victim. 1911 N.Y. Even. Post. 12 Sept. 1 S. A. Potter was arrested to-day on a charge of operating a confidence game. 1933 C. Day Lewis Magnetic Mountain 47 The Insurance Agent, the Vicar, Hard Cheese the Confidence-Tricker. 1951 E. E. Evans-Pritchard Social Anthropol. vi. 122 After giving advice to travellers..to avoid gambling and confidence tricksters. 1955 Sci. Amer. Apr. 102/3 How you would behave toward two groups, one of whom had been told beforehand that you were outgoing, friendly and warm, while the other had been informed that you were surly, hostile and suspicious. Confidence men are well aware of this feedback effect of the milieu. 1959 J. Braine Vodi v. 75 For a second he had an intimation that already on its way was some event likely to make him permanently happy, then decided not to be taken in by the confidence trick. |
11. Used attrib., esp. in Statistics, as confidence coefficient or level, the particular probability used in defining a confidence interval, representing the likelihood that the interval will contain the parameter; confidence interval, a range of values so defined that there is a specified probability that the value of a parameter of a population lies within it; confidence limit, either of the two extreme values of a confidence interval.
| 1934 J. Neyman in Jrnl. R. Statistical Soc. XCVII. 562 The form of this solution consists in determining certain intervals, which I propose to call the confidence intervals.., in which we may assume are contained the values of the estimated characters of the population, the probability of an error in a statement of this sort being equal to or less than 1—ε, where ε is any number 0x {pm}3σ x may be referred to as the 99·973 per cent confidence limits. 1968 Brit. Med. Bull. XXIV. 234/1 The proportion of cases misdiagnosed in this way give approximately unbiased estimates of the required probabilities,..and confidence intervals can be found. |
12. Comb., as confidence-inspiring adj.
| 1891 W. James Let. 23 Aug. in R. B. Perry Tht. & Char. of W.J. (1935) I. 419 Our children grow lovelier every year and more confidence-inspiring. 1948 B. G. M. Sundkler Bantu Prophets S. Afr. v. 128 It is instructive to study the yearly balance sheets of this Church..arranged in a confidence-inspiring manner. |
▪ II. confidence, v. U.S. slang.
(ˈkɒnfɪdəns)
[f. the n.]
trans. To swindle by means of a confidence trick.
| 1875 Chicago Tribune 1 Oct. 4 In a back room of some large building..they are ‘confidenced’ of what money they may have about them. 1888 Missouri Republ. 15 Feb. (Farmer), Detectives..arrested Lawrence Stanley..on a charge of confidencing Henry Mueller. |