keep one's counsel

English

Verb

keep one's counsel (third-person singular simple present keeps one's counsel, present participle keeping one's counsel, simple past and past participle kept one's counsel)

1. To keep one's own business private; to be careful, circumspect, or discreet in what one says concerning one's own deeds, situation, or thoughts.

   Synonyms: hold one's peace, keep one's cards close to one's chest, keep one's mouth shut, keep one's own counsel, keep counsel

   • 1848 November – 1850 December, William Makepeace Thackeray, “Contains both Love and War”, in The History of Pendennis. […], volume I, London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1849, →OCLC, page 56:

     As he held his mother to him, he longed to tell her all, but he kept his counsel.

   • 1982 July 26, “Personal Power, Personal Hate”, in Time‎^[1], New York, N.Y.: Time Warner Publishing, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 8 April 2008:

     [Ruhollah] Khomeini's approach to decision making is to keep his counsel at first, allowing the advocates of different options to debate issues openly.

2. To keep a secret for someone else; to be careful, circumspect, or discreet in what one says concerning someone else's deeds, situation, or thoughts.

   Synonym: keep one's mouth shut

   • 1871–1872, George Eliot [pseudonym; Mary Ann Evans], chapter XLIX, in Middlemarch […], volume III, Edinburgh, London: William Blackwood and Sons, →OCLC, book V, page 105:

     Standish will keep our counsel, and the news will be old before it's known.