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Deceitfulness   Listen
noun
Deceitfulness  n.  
1.
The disposition to deceive; as, a man's deceitfulness may be habitual.
2.
The quality of being deceitful; as, the deceitfulness of a man's practices.
3.
Tendency to mislead or deceive. "The deceitfulness of riches."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Deceitfulness" Quotes from Famous Books



... seed which the apostle sowed in those rich, luxurious, clever, learned, Romans, was like the seed which fell on thorny ground; and the cares and pleasures of this life, and the deceitfulness or riches, sprang up, and choked the word, and it remained unfruitful. But the gospel seed which was sown among our poor, wild, simple, ignorant forefathers, was the seed which fell on an honest ...
— Town and Country Sermons • Charles Kingsley

... the same time, strange to say, very melancholy. Finally, Orchis glanced off from so unpleasing a subject into the most unexpected reflections, taken from a religious point of view, upon the unstableness and deceitfulness of the human heart. But having, as he thought, experienced something of that sort of thing, China Aster did not take exception to his friend's observations, but still refrained from so doing, almost as much for the sake of sympathetic ...
— The Confidence-Man • Herman Melville

... said, "No! Liberty and Independence for ever. I have all my wants, my son." So I gave him a set of new fiddle-strings, and the Brethren didn't advise us any more. Only Pastor Meder he preached about the deceitfulness of riches, and Brother Adam Goos said if there was war the English 'ud surely shoot down the Bank. I knew there wasn't going to be any war, but I drew the money out and on Red Jacket's advice I put it into horse-flesh, which I sold to Bob Bicknell for the Baltimore stage-coaches. That way, ...
— Rewards and Fairies • Rudyard Kipling

... straightway with joy receiveth it; yet hath he not root in himself, but endureth for a while; and when tribulation or persecution ariseth because of the word, straightway he stumbleth. And he that was sown among the thorns, this is he that heareth the word; and the care of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the pleasures of this life, choke the word, and he becometh unfruitful. And he that was sown upon the good ground, this is he that heareth the word in an honest and good heart, and understandeth it, who verily beareth fruit, and bringeth forth, some a hundredfold, ...
— His Life - A Complete Story in the Words of the Four Gospels • William E. Barton, Theodore G. Soares, Sydney Strong

... when, like some elderly black humble-bee, with crooked thighs deep laden with the metallic yellow pollen, he buzzed heavily off for Lorenco Marques, deplored the deceitfulness of riches ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves

... kiss was like a spell—the breaking of the pleasantest link in his life—the passing from sinfulness to a baser selfishness—the stamp and seal upon his bargain with ambition, whereby for the long future he was sold to the sorrow of avarice and the deceitfulness ...
— Bohemian Days - Three American Tales • Geo. Alfred Townsend

... conclusion of which has been quoted above. "In vain, from the famous coasts of Ithaca, the wise and renowned Mentor came to enrich us with those treasures of his which his Telemaque contains. In vain the art of the teacher delicately displays, in this romance of a rare kind, the usefulness and the deceitfulness of politics and of love, as well as that fatal sweetness—frail daughter of luxury—which intoxicates a conquering hero at the feet of a young mistress or of a skilful enchantress, such as in each case this Mentor depicts them. But, well-versed as he was in human weakness, and ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury

... truthful, however, is she not?" said Eleanor. "I can stand anything if a child is that; but deceitfulness——" Her fair young brow contracted, and a slightly hard expression came over ...
— A Christmas Posy • Mary Louisa Stewart Molesworth

... piercing were his eyes. She flushed slightly, and then, conscious of an embarrassment new and strange to her, blushed rosy red, making, as it seemed to her, a stupid remark about the sunset. When he took her words literally, and said the sunset was fine, she felt guilty of deceitfulness. Whatever Helen's faults, and they were many, she was honest, and because of not having looked at the sunset, but only wanting him to see her as did other men, the innocent ruse suddenly appeared ...
— The Last Trail • Zane Grey

... feeling mind, there is something deeply afflicting, in seeing the engaging cheerfulness and cloudless gaiety incident to youth, welcomed as a sufficient indication of internal purity by the delighted parents; who, knowing the deceitfulness of these flattering appearances, should eagerly avail themselves of this period, when once wasted never to be regained, of good humoured acquiescence and dutiful docility: a period when the soft and ductile temper of the mind renders ...
— A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians, in the Middle and Higher Classes in this Country, Contrasted with Real Christianity. • William Wilberforce

... were wrong scarcely ever crossed his mind. To avoid trouble with his mother, therefore, he began slyly and secretly to taste the forbidden fruits which her lavish supplies of money always kept within his reach. In this manner that most hopeless and vitiating of elements, deceitfulness, entered into his character. He denied to his mother, and sought to conceal from her, the truth that while still in his teens he was learning the gambler's infatuation and forming the inebriate's appetite. He tried to prevent her from knowing that many of his most intimate associates were ...
— A Knight Of The Nineteenth Century • E. P. Roe

... to learn through him the deceitfulness of men; and, just as she had formerly found it difficult to believe in evil where it existed, so did she now find it even more difficult to believe in ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. II. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre

... and lament my sins, but necessity compelled me to do what my conscience condemned."... Many, again, I meet with who think these things no crime, because they believe their necessities compel them to live in their sins. Hence their consciences are so hardened through the deceitfulness of sin, that death itself gives ...
— Elizabeth Fry • Mrs. E. R. Pitman

... manhood! Sell your soul for five dollars! You must rate yourself very cheap!" And then, they said, he fairly preached them a sermon on the nobility of perfect truthfulness, and the littleness and meanness of lying and deceitfulness. ...
— Personal Recollections of Pardee Butler • Pardee Butler

... like Scriptures, I could not away with them; being, as yet, but ignorant both of the corruptions of my nature and of the want and worth of Jesus Christ to save me. The new birth did never enter my mind, neither knew I the deceitfulness and treachery of my own wicked heart. And as for secret thoughts, I took no notice of them." My brethren, old and young, what do you think of all that? What have you to say to all that? Does all that not open a window and let a flood of daylight into your own breast? I am sure it does. That is ...
— Bunyan Characters (Second Series) • Alexander Whyte

... but the pure can understand purity. The chief knowledge which we have of God's holiness comes from our acquaintance with unholiness. We know what impurity is—God is not that. We know what injustice is—God is not that. We know what restlessness, and guilt, and passion are, and deceitfulness, and pride, and waywardness—all these we know. God is none of these. And this is our chief acquaintance with His character. We know what God is not. We scarcely can be rightly said to know, that is to feel, what God is. And therefore, ...
— Sermons Preached at Brighton - Third Series • Frederick W. Robertson

... Chinese Accomptants. How their Women dance. A Story of one John Thacker. Their Bark eaten up, and their Ship endangered by the Worm. Of the Worms here and elsewhere. Of Captain Swan. Raja Laut, the General's Deceitfulness. Hunting wild Kine. The Prodigality of some of the English. Captain Swan treats with a Young Indian of a Spice-Island. A Hunting Voyage with the General. His punishing a Servant of his. Of his Wives and Women. A sort of strong Rice-drink. ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898—Volume 39 of 55 • Various

... Adrian, as the door closed behind him, "this is another instance of the deceitfulness of appearances. I always thought Martin a great, brutal fool, yet in his breast, uncultured as it is, the sacred spark still smoulders." And then and there he made up his mind that he would read Martin a further selection of poems upon the ...
— Lysbeth - A Tale Of The Dutch • H. Rider Haggard

... to the poor. The Lord keep thee, for thou walkest in slippery places; there is danger, and thou seest it not; thou trustest to the hearing of the ear and the seeing of the eye; the Lord alone seeth the deceitfulness and the guile of man; and if thou wilt cry mightily to Him, He can direct ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier

... he left the house, when the meeting was over, and having got thus far it might naturally be supposed that he would not rest until he got farther. He had got thus far many a time before, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches had done their part in the past to put the thought away, and ...
— David Fleming's Forgiveness • Margaret Murray Robertson

... only to despise such things as lying, deceitfulness, hypocrisy, and uncleanness—in fact, stenches of the heart and mind,—and not to think too much about these, but, passing on, drop out the recollection of them ...
— The Golden Fountain - or, The Soul's Love for God. Being some Thoughts and - Confessions of One of His Lovers • Lilian Staveley

... case anyone of the communicant members of the congregation, should, through the deceitfulness of sin and of Satan, fall into gross sin, or open works of the flesh, which may God avert, and should such offense be established by credible and incontestible evidence, then shall he: 1.) Be privately admonished by the Pastor ...
— The Organization of the Congregation in the Early Lutheran Churches in America • Beale M. Schmucker

... endued with strength to utter a last solemn admonition, she told him of the evil nature and power of sin, how it separated man from his Maker; of the temptations to be met with in the world, from the deceitfulness and weakness of the human heart, and the example of the ungodly, with whom she begged him to have no communion. She spoke of the necessity there was for constant watchfulness and prayer; told him to avoid all exhibition of self-will or disobedience; ...
— Watch—Work—Wait - Or, The Orphan's Victory • Sarah A. Myers

... not shown himself all the week, and no sooner had he come today than Pelle had to give him a blowing-up for some deceitfulness. Then he ran home, and Pelle lay down at the edge of the fir-plantation, on his face with the soles of his feet in the air, and sang. All round him there were marks of his knife on the tree-stems. On the earliest ships you saw the keel, the deck ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo

... must all lay it continually and with uttermost humiliation to heart that we all have Captain Anything's opportunism, his self-interest, his insincerity, his instability, and his secret deceitfulness in ourselves. That man knows little of himself who does not despise and hate himself for his secret self-seeking even in the service of God. For, how the love of praise will seduce and corrupt this man, and the love of gain that man! How easy it is to flatter ...
— Bunyan Characters - Third Series - The Holy War • Alexander Whyte

... repeated Mr. Teak, in lofty tones. "And suppose I had died first? Or suppose you had died sudden? This is what comes of deceitfulness and keeping things from your husband. ...
— Ship's Company, The Entire Collection • W.W. Jacobs

... and sullen. He was an utterly spoiled boy, if one can be called spoiled, who had so few good qualities which admitted of being spoiled. He inherited his father's bad traits, his selfishness and unscrupulousness, in addition to a spirit of deceitfulness and hypocrisy from his mother's nature. He was not as censurable as he would have been had he not possessed these ...
— Tom, The Bootblack - or, The Road to Success • Horatio Alger

... desk before the window and, reading the stencils line by line, made a perfect copy. As his pen swept across the paper he reflected on the deceitfulness of Senator Hanway, who, with the report written out in full, was for having him think that the committee would not ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis

... has no root in himself, but is only a temporary [disciple]; and when affliction or persecution arises on account of the word, he is immediately offended. [13:22]And he that received seed among thorns is he that hears the word, and the cares of this life and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful. [13:23]But he that received the seed in the good ground is he that hears the word, and understands it, who also bears fruit, and produces some one hundred, and ...
— The New Testament • Various

... she thought, "and I know the measure of a man's deceitfulness, so I can take care of myself, but Thora is a childlike lassie. It would not be fair to put her in danger without word or warning. The lad has a wonderful ...
— An Orkney Maid • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr

... to awaken in the soul of the completely savage man any great interest or concern in the ways and habits of civilized life. The fallen nature, of which all mankind are common partakers, renders it, unfortunately, easy to copy what is evil; and, accordingly, the drunkenness, the deceitfulness, and general licentiousness of depraved Europeans find many admirers and imitators among the simple children of the Australian wilderness; but when anything good, or decent, or even merely useful, is to be taught them, then do they appear dull and inapt scholars ...
— Australia, its history and present condition • William Pridden

... hand. "Go on, Jonaique. It's bad when the deceitfulness of riches is getting the ...
— The Manxman - A Novel - 1895 • Hall Caine

... nation was, as it were, dried up and made inflammable; the idol was as the 'spark' or the occasion for destruction. But a wider application, which comes home to us all, is to the fatal results of sin. These need to be very plainly stated, because of the deceitfulness of sin, which goes on slaying men ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren

... who carry about the name of Christ in deceitfulness, but do things unworthy of God; whom ye must flee, as ye would do so many wild beasts. For they are raving dogs, who bite secretly; against whom ye must guard yourselves, as men hardly to ...
— The Forbidden Gospels and Epistles, Complete • Archbishop Wake

... words added to it, how delightful it was to know that this sweet wild-rose had been blossoming for me, that our singing-bird had been singing for me! I am willing to tell, too, how foolish I felt, when the deceitfulness of the human heart, of my own human heart, became apparent; when I found that I had been loving for myself, while I thought I was loving for David,—that I had been jealous for myself, and not for him; when I found that I had been studying my chapter, ...
— Atlantic Monthly,Volume 14, No. 82, August, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... From self-complacency, From untimely projects, From needless perplexity, From the murdering spirit and devices of Satan, From the influence of the spirit of this world, From hypocrisy and fanaticism, From the deceitfulness of sin, From all sin, Preserve us, gracious Lord ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, No. 23, February, 1873, Vol. XI. • Various

... deeply, day by day, does my understanding find the deceitfulness of my heart. Well do I remember the feelings of determination, with which I resolved, two years since, that this period should not find me halting between two opinions,—that ere this day I would be a Christian indeed. And looking back upon my alternating feelings, ever since reason was ...
— A Brief Memoir with Portions of the Diary, Letters, and Other Remains, - of Eliza Southall, Late of Birmingham, England • Eliza Southall

... into a minute description of the affair, but in vain. Mr. Smith, rising to his feet, denounced his ingratitude in language which was seldom allowed to pass unchallenged in the presence of his wife, while that lady contributed examples of deceitfulness in the past of Mr. Heard, which he strove in vain to refute. Meanwhile, her daughter patted ...
— Short Cruises • W.W. Jacobs

... let all our churches be cleaned with soap, and sand, and mop, and scrubbing brush, and the sexton not forget to give one turn of his broom under the pastor's chair. Would that with one bold and emphatic "scat!" we could drive the last specimen of deceitfulness and ...
— Around The Tea-Table • T. De Witt Talmage

... gone to the Gauls in the service of the republic, and while he was engaged in repelling the barbarians, who already began to distrust their own power, and to be filled with alarm, Dynamius, being restless, like a man of cunning and practised deceitfulness, devised a wicked plot; and in this it is said he had for his accomplices Lampadius, the prefect of the praetorian guard, Eusebius, who had been the superintendent of the emperor's privy purse, and was known by the nickname ...
— The Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus • Ammianus Marcellinus

... with Miss Biddums, who would fain have taught him charity. "He only makes faces wiv his mouf, and when he wants to o-muse me I am not o-mused." And His Majesty the King shook his head as one who knew the deceitfulness ...
— Indian Tales • Rudyard Kipling

... gracious? Hath he in anger shut up his tender mercies?" A man who believes Christ to be the Son of God and the Saviour of the world, if he has searched the scriptures, has been made acquainted with the deceitfulness of the human heart, and the devices of our great adversary. It is on this account he does not always feel assured of his salvation. He is afraid that he may be deceiving himself, and be thinking more highly of himself then he ought to think. He has learned, from the parable of the sower, ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning

... the half minute's rest, feinted with the charge of deceitfulness, and nearly got home heavily with "What would Phyllis say if she knew?" Garnet, however, side-stepped cleverly with "But she won't know," and followed up the advantage with a damaging, "Besides, it's all for the best." ...
— Love Among the Chickens • P. G. Wodehouse

... was. I tell you he's on the make, and don't you forgit it. Some fellers allers has luck. Many 's the time he 'n' I 've been in swim-min' and hookin' apples together when we wuz little chaps," pursued Bill, in a tone implying a mild reproach at the deceitfulness of an analogy that after such fair promise in early life had failed to complete itself in ...
— Hooking Watermelons - 1898 • Edward Bellamy

... comparison. So was I. But Vittie suffered most frequently in this way. Lalage had always displayed a special virulence in dealing with Vittie's public utterances. The remaining voters, 2470 of them or thereabouts, made a silent protest against our deceitfulness by staying away ...
— Lalage's Lovers - 1911 • George A. Birmingham

... stools, so the former learned to read on bits of birch-bark. At an early period of his existence he broke a capful of eggs. He owned a calf. He caught an eel. He put salt on a bird's tail and learned his first lesson of the deceitfulness of the human heart. He walked to Niagara Falls from Buffalo. He got lost in the woods. He went to live with his uncle in Ohio, where he displayed spirit and killed a pig. Here also occurred a "prophecy" almost as striking ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various

... to say, his mind could not determine. The most simple and ordinary act, to take his father by the hand, to kiss him, and to say, "How do you do, father?" seemed to him unspeakably horrible in its monstrous, inhuman, absurd deceitfulness. ...
— The Seven who were Hanged • Leonid Andreyev

... "Oh, are we not foolish and short-sighted men, all of us, yes, even we kings? In order that I might not be, perhaps, forced to send my sixth wife also to the scaffold, I chose, in trembling dread of the deceitfulness of your sex, a widow for my queen, and this widow with a blessed confession, mocks at the new law of the wise Parliament, and makes good to me what she never promised." [Footnote: After Catharine Howard's infidelity and incontinency had been proved, and she ...
— Henry VIII And His Court • Louise Muhlbach

... that I had ever tried to "keep innocency;" and now two years had passed since then, and men were louder and louder in heaping on me the very charges, which this Writer repeats out of my Sermon, of "fraud and cunning," "craftiness and deceitfulness," "double-dealing," "priestcraft," of being "mysterious, dark, subtle, designing," when I was all the time conscious to myself, in my degree, and after my measure, of "sobriety, self-restraint, and control of word and feeling." I had ...
— Apologia Pro Vita Sua • John Henry Cardinal Newman

... voice of a thousand trumpets, that I might reach the ear of Miss Church-Member, and break unto her the words of truth and life. See how she walks on between those two fiends, ever nearing an awful destruction, yet vainly imagining, through the deceitfulness of her advisers, that she is nearing the place where she can, with greater ease, leave her present course and join her comrades on the Shining Path. Oh, that I could send a messenger, good ...
— Mr. World and Miss Church-Member • W. S. Harris

... widow had deceived him! It was eight o'clock, the bank would not open for an hour, she had had the money in the house all the time. The deceitfulness of women! ...
— Golden Stories - A Selection of the Best Fiction by the Foremost Writers • Various

... representatives of the country, boasting itself zealous, not only for the preservation of its own liberties, but for the general rights of mankind, it should be necessary to say a single word upon such a subject; but the deceitfulness of the human heart was such, as to change the appearances of truth, when it stood in opposition to self-interests. And he had to lament that even among those, whose public duty it was to cling to the universal and eternal ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson

... of these Sirens whom Dante takes as the phantasm or deceitfulness of riches; but note further, that she says it was her song that deceived Ulysses. Look back to Dante's account of Ulysses' death, and we find it was not the love of money, but pride of knowledge, that betrayed ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin

... it is written (James 1:8): "A double-minded man is inconstant in all his ways." Now duplicity does not seem to pertain to lust, but rather to deceitfulness, which is a daughter of covetousness, according to Gregory (Moral. xxxi, 45). Therefore the aforesaid vices do ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas

... leaving the way of salvation unmarked and unlighted? Or, sent expressly to show us the way, himself the appointed guide, what welcome can we suppose he would have had from his Father in Heaven, if he had given the duty over to the angels? Or, knowing the deceitfulness of the human heart, and its weakness and liability to temptation, whence the necessity for his coming to us, what if he had given the duty over to men, so much lower than the angels, and then gone away? Rather than such a thought of him, let us believe, if the way had ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 2 • Lew. Wallace

... interesting though all autobiography is, still less can we expect it from the men themselves. In writing his own memoirs, a man will not tell all that he knows about himself. Augustine was a rare exception, but few there are who will, as he did in his 'Confessions,' lay bare their innate viciousness, deceitfulness, and selfishness. There is a Highland proverb which says, that if the best man's faults were written on his forehead he would pull his bonnet over his brow. "There is no man," said Voltaire, "who has not something hateful in him—no man ...
— Character • Samuel Smiles

... brought him to New York, how he had been to Labrador and back, how he had got to Goat Island and found himself there alone. He omitted the matter of the Prince and the Butteridge aspect of the affair, not out of any deep deceitfulness, but because he felt the inadequacy of his narrative powers. He wanted everything to seem easy and natural and correct, to present himself as a trustworthy and understandable Englishman in a sound mediocre position, to whom refreshment and accommodation ...
— The War in the Air • Herbert George Wells

... attain happiness, always remember that you are on the right road, and try not to leave it. Above all, avoid falsehood, every kind of falsehood, especially falseness to yourself. Watch over your own deceitfulness and look into it every hour, every minute. Avoid being scornful, both to others and to yourself. What seems to you bad within you will grow purer from the very fact of your observing it in yourself. Avoid fear, too, though fear is only the consequence of every ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... To obtain victory in battle without cunning or stratagem is the best sport. Gambling, however, as a sport, is not so. Those that are respectable never use the language of the Mlechchas, nor do they adopt deceitfulness in their behaviour. War carried on without crookedness and cunning, this is the act of men that are honest. Do not, O Sakuni, playing desperately, win of us that wealth with which according to our abilities, we strive to learn how ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Part 2 • Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa

... man, were he Machiavel himself, could escape from it; and though I had ample proofs in the above transaction (in which my wife's perfidious designs were frustrated by my foresight), and under her own handwriting, of the deceitfulness of her character and her hatred for me, yet she actually managed to deceive me, in spite of all my precautions and the vigilance of my mother in my behalf. Had I followed that good lady's advice, who scented the danger from ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray

... religious needs with a reasonable degree of adequacy, if he is resolute in purpose and if he has no excessively trying experiences in the face of which his faith breaks down, and if the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches, or the strain of poverty do not too much distract him (and this is a long and formidable list of ifs) then he is faithful in his church relationships and personally devout. He grows in grace and knowledge and the outcome of it ...
— Modern Religious Cults and Movements • Gaius Glenn Atkins

... thanked you for your very kind letter of the 8th, which reached me just as I was starting (paperless and penless) for Madrid. The cares of this world (in the shape of house-hunting), quite unaccompanied by the deceitfulness of riches, have, I am sorry to say, eaten up every hour of my time not otherwise absorbed by official visits and presentations, &c., since we reached—a week ago—this pretty, busy, but horribly hot ...
— Memoirs of the Life and Correspondence of Henry Reeve, C.B., D.C.L. - In Two Volumes. VOL. II. • John Knox Laughton

... as much as one white lie, but had always been frank, open and ingenuous as if she and her husband were not husband and wife, or indeed of opposite sexes. Yet we must rate him as very foolish, that living thus with a fox, which beast has the same reputation for deceitfulness, craft and cunning, in all countries, all ages, and amongst all races of mankind, he should expect this fox to be as candid and honest with him in all things as the ...
— Lady Into Fox • David Garnett

... prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth, and power as no other nation has ever grown; but we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace, and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln

... be forgiven the deceitfulness, and what I may call the impudence of it! I really did give father that same letter to post, and him believing me to be a better girl than I was, to my shame, posted it, not doubting that I had only wrote ...
— In Homespun • Edith Nesbit

... apprehension or the neglect of this declaration. Tens of thousands of professing Christians do not abide in Christ; consequently, He cannot satisfy their soul. The cares and pleasures of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, occupy them as they do the ungodly; for their pleasures they turn to the world. A smaller section have faith in Christ, and realize the joys of Salvation, and comfort of His presence, but they do not yield themselves to Him for service. A smaller section dedicate themselves ...
— The Angel Adjutant of "Twice Born Men" • Minnie L. Carpenter

... you only would! But you have got too far out of the right rut, I fear. Too much over-civilization, and the deceitfulness of riches. It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle. More's the pity. I never came across but two of you who could value a man wholly and solely for what was in him—who thought themselves verily and indeed ...
— Tom Brown's Schooldays • Thomas Hughes

... too have sharp prickles, as anybody will find who stuffs a pillow with them. But our Lord chooses His words to point the lesson that not outward things, but our attitude to them, make the barrenness of this soil. It is not 'this world,' but 'the care of this world,' not 'riches,' but 'the deceitfulness of riches,' that choke the word. These two seem opposites, but they are really the same thing on two opposite sides. The man who is burdened with the cares of poverty, and the man who is deceived by the false promises of wealth, are really the same man. The one is the other turned ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Matthew Chaps. IX to XXVIII • Alexander Maclaren

... from what might have been an irretrievable financial misfortune. Through deceitfulness in others he was led to a disgraceful quarrel with his intimate friend, Colonel Benton, who had helped him so much at Washington. The difficulty with the Creek Indians arising; Jackson with his characteristic ...
— Hidden Treasures - Why Some Succeed While Others Fail • Harry A. Lewis

... too well that there are universal fallacies as well as universal truths of the human mind. For the practical necessities of life the imagination stands to man in good stead, but as the inadequate instrument of speculative thought its fertile deceitfulness is betrayed in his very earliest attempts at philosophy; nor are his subsequent efforts directed to anything else than the endeavour to correct and allow for its refractions and distortions, to transcend its narrow limitations, to force it to express, meanly ...
— The Faith of the Millions (2nd series) • George Tyrrell

... so solemnly (though I can not believe it, for if you ridiculed and disliked me in my noble youth, how can you love the same man in the melancholy wreck of his hopes?), if there be a shadow of truth in your words, you are indeed to be pitied. Ah! you and I have learned at a terrible price the deceitfulness of riches, the hollowness of this world's pleasures; and both have writhed under the poisonous fangs that always dart from the dregs of the cup of sin, which you and I have drained. Experience must ...
— St. Elmo • Augusta J. Evans

... sin.—Have mercy, O compassionate Father, on all who are hardened through the deceitfulness of sin; vouchsafe them grace to come to themselves, the will and power to return to thee, and the loving welcome of thy forgiveness through ...
— A Short History of the Book of Common Prayer • William Reed Huntington

... and minnesingers, of the Arthurian tales, which show that love in narrative form, was, as we have seen, polluted by the selfishness, the deceitfulness, the many unclean necessities of adulterous passion. Elevated and exquisite though it was, it could not really purify the relations of man and woman, since it was impure. Nay, we see that through its influence the grave and simple ...
— Euphorion - Being Studies of the Antique and the Mediaeval in the - Renaissance - Vol. II • Vernon Lee

... . . . shee cryes. This habit of the lapwing gave the bird an evil reputation as a symbol of deceitfulness. Cf. Measure ...
— Bussy D'Ambois and The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois • George Chapman

... Ah yes, now I recollect," said the Greek, with a bland smile. "But you shall judge, sir, how unjustly I am accused. I did lately take charge of a brig for a friend. I was suffering from want of water and bread. See the deceitfulness of the world; I asked it humbly, they gave it willingly, and at the same time this certificate," and he produced the paper signed by the master of the brig. The impudence of the Greek ...
— The Three Midshipmen • W.H.G. Kingston

... it's any partickler pleasure to me, seeing a balloon, though we did get our tea done early to be in time for it—it's the sly deceitfulness of your conduck, MARIA, which is all the satisfaction I get for coming out with you,—it's the feeling that—well, there, I won't talk ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 99, July 12, 1890 • Various

... being among them soon passed away, and they began to show their avarice and deceitfulness in every possible way. The Chiefs united and refused to give us the half of the small piece of land which had been purchased, on which to build our Mission House, and when we attempted to fence in the part they had left to us, they "tabooed" it, i. e. threatened our Teachers ...
— The Story of John G. Paton - Or Thirty Years Among South Sea Cannibals • James Paton

... deception will cover the mistakes believed and made in ignorance, and deceitfulness will include the beliefs in and expression of deceitfulness. On the second day the patient is treated for the world's next greatest beliefs, which are deception and deceitfulness, and as before, we set ...
— The Right Knock - A Story • Helen Van-Anderson

... of many of the brethren, also, who were themselves strong in the faith, and praiseworthy, raised himself up against that wicked spirit to overcome it; for the spirit a little while before, by its subtle deceitfulness, had predicted, furthermore, that a certain adverse and unbelieving tempter would come. Yet that exorcist, inspired by God's grace, bravely resisted and showed that he who before was regarded as holy was a most wicked spirit. But that woman, ...
— A Source Book for Ancient Church History • Joseph Cullen Ayer, Jr., Ph.D.

... illustration of the deceitfulness of sin in the response of the bride. Instead of bounding forth to meet Him, she first comforts her own heart by the remembrance of His faithfulness, and of ...
— Union And Communion - or Thoughts on the Song of Solomon • J. Hudson Taylor

... about it and dung it." I doubt if it is not too much ground-bound. "The love of this world and the deceitfulness of riches" lie too close to the roots of the heart of this professor. The love of riches, the love of honors, the love of pleasures, are the thorns that choke the word; how then can there be fruit brought forth ...
— The Riches of Bunyan • Jeremiah Rev. Chaplin

... deceitfulness an honest man is exposed to! Here have I been surrounded by spies for the last month! A plot between my business acquaintances and the banks! A snake creeping into my house and crawling over my accounts! But I will break up the conspiracy! And you will find out ...
— Three Dramas - The Editor—The Bankrupt—The King • Bjornstjerne M. Bjornson

... her his queen. She did not believe that what people said of him was true—that he was black of heart, and cruel and base. His hollow words had not sounded hollow to her ears nor had she seen anything of deceitfulness in ...
— Olaf the Glorious - A Story of the Viking Age • Robert Leighton

... my brethren. Time passes faster than we think. Our gray hairs gather apace above our foreheads. And the treasure which we prized beyond price in years bygone has perhaps, amid the cares of this world, or in the deceitfulness of riches, been thrust on one side, neglected, at last forgotten. How is it with you, dear friends? Are you the man? Are you the woman? Have you put on one side the very treasure of your life,—as some careless housewife ...
— The Brick Moon, et. al. • Edward Everett Hale

... the poison of his wickedness." [460:6] The same writer insists upon the necessity of penance, a species of discipline unknown to the apostolic Church, and denounces, with terrible severity, those who discouraged its performance. "By the deceitfulness of their lies," says he, they interfere, "that satisfaction be not given to God in His anger..... All pains are taken that sins be not expiated by due satisfactions and lamentations, that wounds be not washed clean by tears." [460:7] It may be ...
— The Ancient Church - Its History, Doctrine, Worship, and Constitution • W.D. [William Dool] Killen

... catching him up and holding him out at arm's length. 'Don, I'm not hard on you, am I? I love you, only I see your faults, and you know it. You're full of deceitfulness' (here she kissed him between the eyes and set him down). 'Aunt Sophy, you would never have found out his trick about the milk if it hadn't ...
— The Talking Horse - And Other Tales • F. Anstey

... among thorns; and the thorns sprang up and choked them ... These are they who hear the Word, but the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the Word so that it become unfruitful (Mt 13:7, 22; Mk 4:7, 18, 19; Lu ...
— Angelic Wisdom about Divine Providence • Emanuel Swedenborg

... the Captain Sahib, understanding the deceitfulness of man's heart. Bishan Singh's tongue is as a horse without bit or bridle. If head and hand carry him as far, he will ...
— Captain Desmond, V.C. • Maud Diver

... confidence of the king. Ferdinand was always mistrustful of Columbus, and with good reason, but never refused Vespucci a favor—if he asked one—or hesitated to give him an audience. The reason was, most probably, that, aside from his deceitfulness (which was a quality the crafty Ferdinand could tolerate in no one but himself), Columbus was constantly importuning him for further honors and emoluments; while Vespucci rarely, if ever, craved glory or riches for himself. Nothing came of Vespucci's intercession at court ...
— Amerigo Vespucci • Frederick A. Ober

... directly in advance of our bows. For that singular craft at times evinced by the Sperm Whale when, sounding with his head in one direction, he nevertheless, while concealed beneath the surface, mills round, and swiftly swims off in the opposite quarter —this deceitfulness of his could not now be in action; for there was no reason to suppose that the fish seen by Tashtego had been in any way alarmed, or indeed knew at all of our vicinity. One of the men selected for shipkeepers — that is, those not appointed to the boats, ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville

... receiveth it; yet hath he not root in himself, but dureth for a while: for when tribulation or persecution ariseth because of the word, by and by he is offended. He also that received seed among the thorns is he that heareth the word; and the care of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, choke the word, and he becometh unfruitful. But he that received seed into the good ground is he that heareth the word, and understandeth it; which also beareth fruit, and bringeth forth, some an ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage

... thoroughly tired—no new thing with him—but who would not submit to be thrown aside, like a cast-off glove, without making a struggle to regain the favour of her ci-devant admirer. He was anathematizing the vanity, treachery, and deceitfulness of all women, without exception, from the duchess down to the dairy-maid, and declaring that he should renounce their society altogether for the future, when they reached the end of the walk, at the house, and turned about ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier

... dispenses her pardons. Every thing was favourable to penitence. She was alone, and solitude has sometimes shaken the purpose of the sinner, and opened his eyes to an awful perception of the atrociousness of guilt. But Sapphira was "hardened through the deceitfulness of sin." Long since she had dismissed every compunctious feeling, and was hurried on to perdition by the fiends of avarice and vanity, to whom she had resigned the dominion of her soul. The inquiry ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. II • Francis Augustus Cox

... hears it, it is a folly and weakness to him. A folly certainly it is to give this gospel a repulse before ye hear it. It promiseth life and immortality, which nothing else doth. And you entertain other things upon lower promises and expectations, even after frequent experiences of their deceitfulness. What a madness then is it to hear this promise of life in Christ so often beaten upon you, and yet never so much as to put him to the proof of it, and to put him off continually who knocks at your hearts, before you will consider attentively, who it is that ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning

... ear of wholesome admonition from the parable of the Sower. "The deceitfulness of riches!" he murmured. "How true!" And he subjected himself to the most vigilant scrutiny, lest he should be beguiled by the unlimited possibilities of self-indulgence which his wealth supplied. He turned ...
— The Golden Shoemaker - or 'Cobbler' Horn • J. W. Keyworth

... was short and stout, with an unusually low and degraded countenance and apelike arms. His whole expression denoted deceitfulness. ...
— The Beasts of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... since. Of course, the obvious answer of the self-satisfied male is that he is the lord of creation, that his is the better part which shall not be taken from him. Yet this does not prevent his telling his wife sometimes, when oppressed with the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches, that 'it is nice to be her. Nothing to worry her all day long. No responsibility.' For in his primitive vision of female existence, his wife languidly presides for ever at an eternal five-o'clock tea. And it is not in the province of this article to turn to him the seamy side ...
— Prose Fancies • Richard Le Gallienne

... our nature, through the deceitfulness of the heart, the zeal which, in its proper exercise, is admirable, as inciting us to a grand enthusiasm in a cause believed to be true and holy, ofttimes degenerates into a blind and bitter bigotry, as unreasoning as reprehensible; the faith which pierces ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No 3, September 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... good gifts of Providence, being endowed not only with considerable mental power, but with the tact to use that power to the best advantage. Although beyond doubt clever, he was universally esteemed a much more intellectual man than he really was, and this through no voluntary deceitfulness on his part, but owing to a method he had unconsciously adopted of exhibiting his wares with their most favorable aspect to the front. He was well read, but not deeply read, and yet all Paris considered him a profound scholar; he was quick and epigrammatic ...
— The Galaxy, Volume 23, No. 2, February, 1877 • Various

... revenge. This story of the basket became very popular; it was introduced into a well known French fabliau[33]; and Bulwer worked it, with slight changes, into his novel of "Pelham," where Monsieur Margot experiences the same sad reflections concerning the deceitfulness of woman, which had long before passed through ...
— A History of English Prose Fiction • Bayard Tuckerman



Words linked to "Deceitfulness" :   disingenuousness, deceitful, craftiness, guile



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