These words refer to a readiness to believe what one is told. Gullible emphasizes that a person can be easily tricked or cheated; credulous is less intense, suggesting simply a willingness to believe on slight evidence, without implying the presence of trickery in presenting the evidence. Gullible might suggest the greedy hope of getting something for nothing, so easily exploited by confidence men. Credulous might more appropriately suggest religious or superstitious persuasion that does not necessarily result in material gain for either the persuader or persuaded. A credulous person, furthermore, might be brought to believe something without acting upon it to his own harm, whereas a gullible person’s belief, by implication, causes him to act in a foolish way that injures himself or others.

• Hamlet fears being credulous of the host’s story – he must corroborate it; Shakespeare’s audience saw Othello less as a jealous man than as a gullible one, easily duped by Iago’s machinations.

Trusting suggests the same willingness to believe as gullible or credulous , but ranges from neutrality of tone to one of approval: a trusting girl alone in the big city; a people so trusting in the guarantees of a future life as to be unshakably free from all temptation. Naïve , on the other hand, suggests an inexperienced optimism, an unawareness of the compromises life entails. A naïve person is certainly trusting ; he is also likely to be credulous ; he would, furthermore, be thought gullible by the sophisticate. Naïve suggests an untried or untested person rather than one necessarily gullible . Only when the naïve person has made a fool of himself by permitting himself to be tricked does he actually become gullible .