Definition of "precept"

precept

/ˈpɹiːsɛpt/

noun
plural precepts
1. A rule or principle, especially one governing personal conduct.
  Quotations
  I need hardly point out that Pinker doesn't really believe anything of what he writes, at least if example is stronger evidence of belief than precept.
  2006, Theodore Dalrymple, The Gift of Language‎
  He found a people in the extreme of barbarism living in caves, feeding upon the bloody flesh of animals they killed in hunting; he taught them many things, so that by his example, and for generations after he left them by his precepts, they advanced to high civilization.
  1891, Susan Hale, Mexico (The Story of the Nations), volume 27, London: T. Fisher Unwin, page 80
2. (law) A written command, especially a demand for payment.
3. (UK) An order issued by one local authority to another specifying the rate of tax to be charged on its behalf.
  1. A rate or tax set by a precept.
verb
third-person singular simple present precepts, present participle precepting, simple past and past participle precepted
1. (intransitive, chiefly US, medicine) To act as a preceptor; to teach a physician-in-training by supervising their clinical practice.
2. (transitive, obsolete) To teach (something) by precepts.
  Quotations
  [T]he tvvo commended rules by him [Aristotle] ſet down, vvhereby the axioms of Sciences are precepted to be made convertible, and vvhich the latter men have not vvithout elegancy ſurnamed; the one the rule of truth, becauſe it preventeth deceipt; the other the rule of prudence, becauſe it freeth election, are the ſame thing in ſpeculation and affirmation, vvhich vve novv obſerve.
  1603 (date written), Bowyer, published 1734, page 411