These similar-sounding nouns have different and unrelated meanings.
A vise is a tool, a kind of clamp, used in woodworking or metalworking to hold objects in fixed positions while working on them. They always consist of two parts, like jaws, that open and close by moving on a large screw.
The word vise is also used to describe a strong grip (the power of the hand to hold), or any kind of abstract “holding” power:
Johnny was frozen in place by the vise-like grip of fear.
Poor Americans are caught in a vise between low wages and over-priced health care.
Vice, on the other hand, means moral flaw, bad habit, or sin—traditionally, the opposite of a virtue. Vice can mean (1) a singular flaw or bad habit in a person, or (2) sin in general. In meaning 1, vice is a count-noun, and in meaning 2, it is a noncount noun:
Tonya had two vices—drinking and lying. (bad habit or moral flaw; count-noun)
It’s unfair that my hometown, New Orleans, has a reputation for being a city of vice and corruption. (sin in general; non-count noun)
In the Western cultural tradition, “the seven vices” are pride, envy, gluttony, greed, lust, laziness, and anger. However, most Westerners do not think of these when referring to vices nowadays, so vices, generally speaking, have become things bad for your health and success, like smoking, drinking, and gambling.
Vice also has another meaning in words like vice-president, where it means back-up—a potential replacement for the president in certain scenarios.
More Examples of “Vise” in a Sentence
- I’ve snuck away from Thanksgiving dinner while a vise grip squeezed my chest.
- For black Americans, that “sandwich” has been more of a deadly vise grip.
- Using a vise to hold the tool as you file is helpful.
- He felt as if it were being squeezed in a vise.
- Lastly, the knife is placed into a vise and flexed for 90 degrees.
More Examples of “Vice” in a Sentence
- In science, faith is a vice,” he said.
- For some writers, the em dash is a vice that their editors occasionally forgive but more often forbid.
- In science, faith without evidence is a vice, while in religion it’s a virtue.
- Gambling is a vice.
- Smoking is a vice.