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From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.44 [gcide]:
Subtile \Sub"tile\, adjective [L. subtilis. See {Subtile}.]
1. Thin; not dense or gross; rare; as, subtile air; subtile vapor; a subtile medium.
2. Delicately constituted or constructed; nice; fine; delicate; tenuous; finely woven. ''A sotil [subtile] twine's thread.'' --Chaucer.
More subtile web Arachne can not spin. --Spenser.
I do distinguish plain Each subtile line of her immortal face. --Sir J. Davies.
3. Acute; piercing; searching.
The slow disease and subtile pain. --Prior.
5. Characterized by nicety of discrimination; discerning; delicate; refined; subtle. [In this sense now commonly written {subtle}.]
The genius of the Spanish people is exquisitely subtile, without being at all acute; hence there is so much humor and so little wit in their literature. The genius of the Italians, on the contrary, is acute, profound, and sensual, but not subtile; hence what they think to be humorous, is merely witty. --Coleridge.
The subtile influence of an intellect like Emerson's. --Hawthorne.
5. Sly; artful; cunning; crafty; subtle; as, a subtile person; a subtile adversary; a subtile scheme. [In this sense now commonly written {subtle}.]
Syn: {Subtile}, {Acute}.
Usage: In acute the image is that of a needle's point; in subtile that of a thread spun out to fineness. The acute intellect pierces to its aim; the subtile (or subtle) intellect winds its way through obstacles. -- {Sub"tile*ly}, adverb -- {Sub"tile*ness}, noun
From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:
96 Moby Thesaurus words for "subtile": Byzantine, Machiavellian, Machiavellic, acute, adulterated, air-built, airy, arch, artful, astute, attenuate, attenuated, cagey, calculating, canny, chimerical, clever, cloud-built, crafty, cunning, cut, cute, dainty, deceitful, deep, deep-laid, delicate, designing, devious, dilute, diluted, diplomatic, dreamlike, ethereal, fanciful, fatuitous, fatuous, feline, fine, flimsy, foxy, gaseous, gossamery, guileful, illusory, imaginary, ingenious, insidious, insubstantial, inventive, knowing, pawky, phantomlike, politic, rare, rarefied, ready, resourceful, scheming, serpentine, shadowy, sharp, shifty, shrewd, slick, slight, slippery, sly, smooth, snaky, sneaky, sophistical, spirituous, stealthy, strategic, subtle, supple, tactical, tenuous, thin, thinned, thinned-out, trickish, tricksy, tricky, uncompact, uncompressed, unreal, unsubstantial, vaporous, vulpine, wary, watered, watered-down, wily, windy
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