Deceiving Quotes - Page 20

• Looks can be deceiving; it's eating that's believing.

  James Thurber

  Believe, Food, Cooking

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• I do think that sometimes you can invent more palatable or digestible reasons versions or reasons, when perhaps you don't want to admit the truth to yourself, and sometimes we deceive ourselves - along with others - about our reasons and motives.

  Adam Brody

  Thinking, Want, Sometimes

  "Adam Brody Makes Some Winsome Wagers". Interview with Alice Greenberg, www.interviewmagazine.com. April 20, 2012.

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• Honest men love women; those who deceive them adore them.

  Pierre Beaumarchais

  Love, Men, Honest

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• Criticism is above all a gift, an intuition, a matter of tact and flair; it cannot be taught or demonstrated--it is an art. Critical genius means an aptitude for discerning truth under appearances or in disguises which conceal it; for discovering it in spite of the errors of testimony, the frauds of tradition, the dust of time, the loss or alteration of texts. It is the sagacity of the hunter whom nothing deceives for long, and whom no ruse can throw off the trail.

  Henri Frederic Amiel

  Art, Mean, Loss

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• Cunning grows in deceit at seeing itself discovered, and tries to deceive with truth itselft.

  Baltasar Gracian

  Trying, Deceit, Cunning

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• Conceit and confidence are both of them cheats; the first always imposes on itself, the second frequently deceives others too.

  George Zimmerman

  Firsts, Cheat, Conceit

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• Communists, socialists and fascists everywhere, from Mr. Obama upward, have taken to the global warming cause like a quack to colored water. Just about every word they utter on this subject is a falsehood calculated to deceive, or - in plain English - a lie.

  Christopher Monckton, 3rd Viscount Monckton of Brenchley

  Lying, Taken, Water

  "Leftists are immoral: Pray for them" by Christopher Monckton, www.wnd.com. December 24, 2013.

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• It is said that ridicule is the test of truth: it is never applied, but when we wish to deceive ourselves.

  Letitia Elizabeth Landon

  Wish, Tests, Said

  Letitia Elizabeth Landon (1857). “The Complete Works of L. E. Landon ...”

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• Whoso neglects a thing which he suspects he ought to do, because it seems to him too small a thing, is deceiving himself; it is not too little, but too great for him, that he doeth it not.

  Edward Bouverie Pusey

  Littles, Neglect, Duty

  Edward Bouverie Pusey (1883). “Maxims and gleanings from the writings of E.B. Pusey, selected by C.M.S.”

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• Without enthusiasm, the adventurer could never kindle that fire in his followers which is so necessary to consolidate their mutual interests; for no one can heartily deceive numbers who is not first of all deceived himself.

  William Warburton

  Fire, Numbers, Mutual Interest

  William Warburton, William Warburton (Bp. of Gloucester), Richard Hurd (1811). “The Works of the Right Reverend William Warburton, D.D., Lord Bishop of Gloucester: To which is Prefixed a Discourse by Way of General Preface, Containing Some Account of the Life, Writings, and Character of the Author”, p.136

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• Doth some one say that there be gods above? There are not; no, there are not. Let no fool, Led by the old false fable, thus deceive you. Look at the facts themselves, yielding my words, No undue credence: for I say that kings kill, rob, break oaths, lay cities waste by fraud, And doing thus are happier than those, Who live calm pious lives day after day. All divinity is built-up from our good and evil luck.

  Euripides

  Kings, Cities, Evil

  "Bellerophon". Play by Euripides, estimated between 455 and 425 BCE.

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• It is far more probable that our senses should deceive us, than that an old woman should be carried up a chimney on a broom stick; and that it is far less astonishing that witnesses should lie, than that witches should perform the acts that were alleged.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Lying, Atheism, Sticks

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• This was one of the greatest test of his faith he had ever experienced. The thought of deceiving the kind and faithful wife of his youth... was more than he felt able to bear.... his sorrow and misery were increased by the thought of my mother hearing it from some other source, which would no doubt separate them, and he shrank from the thought of such a thing, or of causing her any unhappiness.

  Orson F. Whitney

  Mother, Wife, Faithful

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• Recruiting can be a little deceiving at times. You never know what you've got until you really, really play it out.

  Steve Spurrier

  Play, Littles, Knows

  Source: thetandd.com

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• Conscience is the voice of the soul, the passions are the voice of the body. Is it astonishing that often these two languages contradict each other, and then to which must we listen? Too often reason deceives us; we have only too much acquired the right of refusing to listen to it; but conscience never deceives us; it is the true guide of man; it is to man what instinct is to the body; which follows it, obeys nature, and never is afraid of going astray.

  Jean-Jacques Rousseau

  Passion, Men, Two

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• Self-interest is the most ingenious and persuasive of all the agents that deceive our consciences, while by means of it our unhappy and stubborn prejudices operate in their greatest force.

  William C. Bryant

  Mean, Self, Unhappy

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• There is nothing in which men more deceive themselves than in what they call zeal.

  Joseph Addison

  Men, Zeal

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• There is nothing so delightful as the hearing, or the speaking of truth. For this reason, there is no conversation so agreeable as that of the man of integrity, who hears without any intention to betray, and speaks without any intention to deceive.

  Plato

  Integrity, Men, Hearing

  Socrates, Plato, Aristotle (1967). “Wit and Wisdom of Socrates, Plato, Aristotle: Being a Treasury of Thousands of Glorious, Inspiring and Imperishable Thoughts, Views and Observations of the Three Great Greek Philosophers, Classified Under about Four Hundred Subjects for Comparative Study”

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• Plants do everything animals do, but slowly. They migrate, communicate, deceive, stalk their food and, with an ostentation of styles and perfumes to put the animal kingdom to shame, they make love. It's just that catching them in flagrante delicto might require time-lapse photography.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Photography, Animal, Making Love

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• It is double pleasure to deceive the deceiver.
  [Fr., Car c'est double plaisir de tromper le trompeur.]

  Jean de La Fontaine

  Car, Deceit, Pleasure

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• He that applauds him who does not deserve praise, is endeavoring to deceive the public; he that hisses in malice or sport, is an oppressor and a robber.

  Samuel Johnson

  Sports, Doe, Praise

  Samuel Johnson (1800). “The Idler: With Additional Essays”, p.86

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• Vice can deceive under the guise and shadow of virtue.

  Juvenal

  Shadow, Vices, Virtue

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• O vanity, how little is thy force acknowledged or thy operations discerned! How wantonly dost thou deceive mankind under different disguises! Sometimes thou dost wear the face of pity; sometimes of generosity; nay, thou hast the assurance to put on those glorious ornaments which belong only to heroic virtue.

  Henry Fielding

  Vanity, Generosity, Different

  Henry Fielding (1832). “The Adventures of Joseph Andrews”, p.52

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• Gaze not on beauty too much, lest it blast thee; nor too long, lest it blind thee; nor too near, lest it burn thee. If thou like it, it deceives thee; if thou love it, it disturbs thee; if thou hunt after it, it destroys thee. If virtue accompany it, it is the heart's paradise; if vice associate it, it is the soul's purgatory. It is the wise man's bonfire, and the fool's furnace.

  Francis Quarles

  Beauty, Wise, Heart

  Francis Quarles (1844). “Enchiridion Institutions, Essays and Maxims, political, moral & divine. Divided into four centuries. By Francis Quarles”, p.57

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• Imagination comes from yourself and can deceive you, but vision is a gift from outside yourself - like light striking on your closed eyelids and lifting them to see what's really there.

  Elizabeth Goudge

  Light, Imagination, Vision

  Elizabeth Goudge (1948). “Pilgrim's Inn”

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