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Craftiness

noun
1.
Shrewdness as demonstrated by being skilled in deception.  Synonyms: craft, cunning, foxiness, guile, slyness, wiliness.
2.
The quality of being crafty.  Synonyms: deceitfulness, guile.






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"Craftiness" Quotes from Famous Books



... that, God drew near to him and cared for him and guided him, and promised that He would not leave him till He had done that which He had spoken to him of. And He will do the same for us—blessed be His name!—with all our faults and weaknesses and craftiness and worldliness and sins. If He cared for that huckstering Jew, as He did, even in his earlier days, He will not put us away because He finds faults in us. 'The God of Jacob,' the supplanter, the trickster, ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... wrath, by confusion, and all the more cast down because, with his Norman cunning, he was quite capable of doing the thing with which he was charged, and even of boasting of it as a shrewd trick. He had a confused idea that his innocence was impossible to establish, his craftiness being so well known. And he was cut to the heart by the injustice ...
— Short-Stories • Various

... think I was afraid to let him know that Mrs. Richie could be depended upon to help us!" He looked up as if in smiling confession to some unseen Friend. "Yes, indeed; 'He taketh the wise in their own craftiness.' It was the promise of Mrs. Richie's help that scared him into it! I won't be so crafty next time," he ...
— The Awakening of Helena Richie • Margaret Deland

... Prince, let not the benevolence of your heart be your undoing, for in the loveliness of her face is cunning and great peril. I have lived all my days amid the craftiness of women, and my lord also knows somewhat of their strange tricks, which bring ruin ...
— Judith • Arnold Bennett

... 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 ...
— Apologia Pro Vita Sua • John Henry Cardinal Newman

... a young man of twenty-five, tall, thin, and with a face that was a mixture of craftiness and cowardice. He was the son of a half-brother to the late Colonel Ruthven and could boast of but few of the good traits of Marion's family. He lived on a plantation half a mile from the bay and spent most of his time in attention ...
— Young Captain Jack - The Son of a Soldier • Horatio Alger and Arthur M. Winfield

... mass of the people to any true 'shepherd of men.' It may be deemed unnecessary that I should specify this point, for it is a truth applicable to the people of all nations. Speaking generally, government is by no device or cunning craftiness; human nature demands it. But in no other family of mankind is the characteristic so largely developed as in the Chinese. The love of order and quiet, and a willingness to submit to 'the powers that be,' eminently distinguish them. Foreign writers have often taken notice ...
— THE CHINESE CLASSICS (PROLEGOMENA) • James Legge

... should still be in love with her ... if he should ask her to be his wife? If she could be a bit clever, if she avoided compromising herself in any way, and understood how to fascinate him—she felt rather ashamed of her craftiness. But, after all, was it so bad that she should think of such things, considering that she was really in love with him, and had never loved any other man but him? And did not the whole tone of his letter give her the right to indulge in ...
— Bertha Garlan • Arthur Schnitzler

... his wisdom by submission to the truth; for that cunning craftiness which manifests itself only in ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 191, June 25, 1853 • Various

... King of Babylon, the Kings of Israel—who most completely ruined themselves at the moment when by wisest counsels they were zealous to strengthen and pacify their kingdoms. For it is He who taketh the wise in their own craftiness, and overturns the mountains before they know it. Therefore it is needful to fear God. I do not say these things because my teaching or admonition is necessary to persons of such eminence, but because I ought not to withhold from Germany my due obedience. And with ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 7 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Orators • Elbert Hubbard

... and not only you, but your posterity, and the whole race of mankind. Moreover, for this crime, I will curse and spoil the heavens, the earth, and the whole fabric of nature. But thou, in the first place, vile beast, shall bear the punishment of thy craftiness and malice. Hereafter shall thou go creeping on thy belly, and instead of eating apples, shall lick the dust of the earth. As for you, Mrs. Curious, who so much love delicacies, in sorrow-shall you bring forth your ...
— Ancient and Modern Celebrated Freethinkers - Reprinted From an English Work, Entitled "Half-Hours With - The Freethinkers." • Charles Bradlaugh, A. Collins, and J. Watts

... like a ploughman's Sunday coat; his accent was rude, broad, and dragging. Take him at his best, and even when he could be induced to hold his tongue, his mere presence in a corner of the drawing-room, with his open-air wrinkles, his scanty hair, his battered hands, and the cheerful craftiness of his expression, advertised the whole gang of us for a self-made family. My aunt might mince and my cousins bridle, but there was no getting over the solid, physical fact of the stonemason ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 13 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... perfections also, which before were hid from us, and see why it is that, though the Gospel is set on a hill in the midst of the world, like a city which cannot be hid, yet to multitudes it is notwithstanding hid, since He taketh the wise in their own craftiness, and the pure in ...
— Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VIII (of 8) • John Henry Newman

... had laid out on the bed a brown coat of velveteen, with breeches to match, and stockings with brown clocks, and also a brown beaver, the back looped up, all of which she had, with sweet craftiness, provided, that I might appear ...
— Hugh Wynne, Free Quaker • S. Weir Mitchell

... compatriots. Greeks, too—small, lithe, dark men, with keen faces and dark eyes, differing wonderfully from the calm, dignified, handsome Turks, but handsome in their way if it had not been for a peculiarly sharp, shifty expression that suggested craftiness and a desire to overreach, if ...
— Yussuf the Guide - The Mountain Bandits; Strange Adventure in Asia Minor • George Manville Fenn

... stayed the sons of Hermes, rich in corn-land, well skilled in craftiness, Erytus and Echion, and with them on their departure their kinsman Aethalides went as the third; him near the streams of Amphrysus Eupolemeia bare, the daughter of Myrmidon, from Phthia; the two others were sprung from Antianeira, daughter ...
— The Argonautica • Apollonius Rhodius

... true that no immediate overt act of hostility had for some time been perpetrated by the Indians, who were assembled in force around the former garrison; but the experienced officer to whom the command had been intrusted was too sensible of the craftiness of the surrounding hordes to be deceived, by any outward semblance of amity, into neglect of those measures of precaution which were so indispensable to the ...
— Wacousta: A Tale of the Pontiac Conspiracy (Complete) • John Richardson

... me what sort of fish they had been eating. On examining the skin I found they had been feasting on a large snake. Another custom still more extraordinary is that no woman is allowed to eat an egg. This prohibition, whether arising from ancient superstition or from the craftiness of some old bushreen who loved eggs himself, is rigidly adhered to, and nothing will more affront a woman of Teesee than to offer her an egg. The custom is the more singular, as the men eat eggs without scruple in the presence of their wives, and I ...
— Travels in the Interior of Africa - Volume 1 • Mungo Park

... care so to deliver it to us, it should be ours to seek so to continue it; and the rather, because of the unaptness of the minds, even of the saints themselves, to retain it without commixture. For, to say nothing of the projects of hell, and of the cunning craftiness of some that lie in wait to deceive even the godly themselves, as they are dull of hearing, so much more dull in receiving and holding fast the simplicity of the gospel of Jesus Christ. From their sense, and reason, and unbelief, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... inclined to prefer Mazarin to Conde, and she ventured to advise laying hands on the victor of Rocroy and Lens. In 1651—an interval of incertitude for Mazarin, who very nearly ensnared himself in the meshes of his own craftiness and a too-complicated line of conduct—a great interest, the well-founded hope of marrying her daughter Charlotte to the Prince de Conti, brought her back once more to the Conde party, and hence the deliverance of the imprisoned Princes. In 1652, the accumulated ...
— Political Women, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Sutherland Menzies

... standing tall and erect, had watched the women go out. How typical the party was of Natalie, of her meticulous care in small things and her indifference or real ignorance as to what counted. Was it indifference, really, or was it supreme craftiness, the stupidity of her dinners, the general unattractiveness of the women she gathered around her, the ill-assortment of people who had little in themselves ...
— Dangerous Days • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... man, wherever he may be, must resolve, notwithstanding dangers or threatings, to walk in simplicity as God has commanded. Let him guard as much as he can against the ravening of the wolves, but let it not be with carnal craftiness. Above all, let him place his life in the hands of God. ...
— The World's Great Sermons, Volume I - Basil to Calvin • Various

... officer, his yellow canines showing like tusks. His matted face was an unlovely sight. In it stark, naked fear struggled with craftiness and cruelty. ...
— Man Size • William MacLeod Raine

... otherwise; therefore I still assert, that the scriptures ought to be carefully examined, conscientiously improved and applied. The faithful minister of Christ will renounce the hidden things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness, nor handling the word of God deceitfully, but by manifestation of the truth, commending themselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God. "For we are not as many which corrupt the word of God; but as ...
— A Series of Letters In Defence of Divine Revelation • Hosea Ballou

... 1763, a celebrated chief of the Ottawas, called Pontiac, succeeded in forming a confederacy of the Ottawas, Hurons, Chippewas, and some other tribes, with the avowed object of expelling the British from the lake regions of the country. With the craftiness peculiar to the Indian race, an ingenious stratagem was devised, by means of which it was hoped that the allies would easily ...
— The Ontario Readers: Fourth Book • Various

... conversation, and well governed carriage: which is almost miraculous among good wits in these declining and corrupt times; when there is nothing but roguery in villainous man, and when cheating and craftiness are counted the cleanest ...
— An English Garner - Critical Essays & Literary Fragments • Edited by Professor Arber and Thomas Seccombe

... That know the joy of white virginity, Most hate in heaven. She sent her fire to run In Phaedra's veins, so that she loved thy son. Yet strove she long with love, and in the stress Fell not, till by her Nurse's craftiness Betrayed, who stole, with oaths of secrecy, To entreat thy son. And he, most righteously, Nor did her will, nor, when thy railing scorn Beat on him, broke the oath that he had sworn, For God's sake. And thy Phaedra, panic-eyed, Wrote a false writ, and slew thy son, and died, ...
— Hippolytus/The Bacchae • Euripides

... no longer children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, in craftiness, ...
— Leaves of Life - For Daily Inspiration • Margaret Bird Steinmetz

... not much of an argument, regarded dispassionately; yet it shook me. With sudden craftiness I resolved to ...
— The Firefly Of France • Marion Polk Angellotti

... to help us break up housekeeping," he said with his winning smile; "but I must confess that I for one have deceived you. I planned to get you all here for a totally different purpose, and I trust you will approve of my craftiness when you have seen what I ...
— Miss Pat at School • Pemberton Ginther

... darners of stockings; makers of puddings; appendages to wash days, bakings, and brewings; echoes and adjectives to men for ever and ever. They are compounds of tears, hysterics, frettings, scoldings, complainings; made up of craftiness and imbecilities, to be wheedled, and coaxed, and coerced like unmanageable children. The idea of a true, noble womanhood is yet to be created. It does not live in the public mind. Now, in answer to the petition of these two thousand women, the Committee ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage

... Rydal, and he had the craftiness to realize that his knowledge was of value. Next day everyone in Mangadone knew that the hue and cry was out after the absconded clerk. He had betrayed his trust, cheated and defrauded his employers, ...
— The Pointing Man - A Burmese Mystery • Marjorie Douie

... pieces of cannon with his ten thousand men, but he is not present in person; the wary chief is abiding his time in the hills; he has, however, deputed a vakeel to offer a nuzzur at Lahore to our resident; but deep craftiness and the most wily treachery are at the bottom of this proceeding. The vakeel has been instructed to apprise his master of every single occurrence that takes place at Lahore, and to keep him well informed of all movements on our part. It is extremely strange ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan

... him! Ser Francesco, you must have heard all over the world how Maria Gargarelli, who lived in the service of our paroco, somehow was outwitted by Satanasso. Monsignore thought the paroco had not done all he might have done against his wiles and craftiness, and sent his Reverence over to the monastery in the mountains, Laverna yonder, to make him look sharp; and ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor

... A look of craftiness flashed from Boehm's eyes. "I have given you my diagnosis," he said, "but it may not be final. I have already communicated my first report to His Majesty and he has ordered me to remain with you for some days. If I should alter that opinion too ...
— City of Endless Night • Milo Hastings

... oriental craftiness, was still guileless enough to expect some sign of gratitude from her; but; as he touched her she shrank in loathing. His anger flamed and he flung her ...
— The Adventures of Kathlyn • Harold MacGrath

... opposed to every virtue, not only vices that are in manifest opposition to virtue, as temerity is opposed to prudence, but also vices which have a kind of kinship and not a true but a spurious likeness to virtue; thus in opposition to prudence we have craftiness." ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas

... way, by degrees, the original Sakai race diminished whilst new clans sprang up around them, formed of those who had been, and continued to be, in contact with comparatively civilized people, who knew their languages and their craftiness, notwithstanding which they frequently became their dupes under the show ...
— My Friends the Savages - Notes and Observations of a Perak settler (Malay Peninsula) • Giovanni Battista Cerruti

... money-lender—but in an equally small way. Loans of minor amounts, a very few dollars as a maximum, was probably the extent of Sonnino's ventures along this line. Sonnino himself was a crafty little man, but craftiness, if it did not transgress the law, was not a crime; he was undoubtedly a usurer in his petty way, and he was both feared and disliked, but beyond that no one pretended to know anything about him. Ordinarily, Sonnino's safe, then, might be expected to be rather a barren affair, hardly a lure for ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard

... unpleasantly affected by the hyper-mercantile craftiness of one of my publishers whom you mention in your letter. It would truly be unjust if you were not to receive the usual discount, and indeed an exceptional amount, when purchasing the "Faust Symphony." But who would ever succeed in washing a negro white? And, in ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 2: "From Rome to the End" • Franz Liszt; letters collected by La Mara and translated

... adopted singing as an essential part of public worship; but this, like the reading of the Scriptures, was too frequently in an unknown tongue, by an affectation of wisdom, to excite the veneration of ignorance, when the learned, in their craftiness, taught that "Ignorance is the mother of devotion;" and Ignorance was very willing to believe it. At the era of the Reformation, psalms and hymns, in the vernacular tongue, were revived in Germany, England, and elsewhere, among the other means of grace, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 351 - Volume 13, Saturday, January 10, 1829 • Various

... have spoken out at once with the splendid honesty characteristic of her nation, but Gwenda, being a thorough Welshwoman, acted differently. With what detractors of the Celtic character would probably call "craftiness," but what we prefer to call "tact and tenderness," she determined not to ruffle the existing happy state of affairs by risking a misunderstanding with her lover, but would rather wait until, as a wife, she could bring the whole influence of her own honest nature ...
— Garthowen - A Story of a Welsh Homestead • Allen Raine

... Joseph, taking of his tea with Miss Iris," replied Mr. James, not at all offended by the allusion to his craftiness. Who should resemble the fox if not the second-hand bookseller? In no trade, perhaps, can the truly admirable qualities of that animal—his patience, his subtlety and craft, his pertinacity, his sagacity—be illustrated more to advantage. ...
— In Luck at Last • Walter Besant

... I must! It is the truth. I felt that you cared—women are surer in such matters than men. I must conceal nothing from you—nothing of my craftiness. Women are crafty, you know. And suppose you fail? Ah, I do not mean failure—you cannot fail, now. You have put yourself forever beyond failure. But what I mean is, suppose you were compelled to leave St. John's, and I came to you then as I have come now, and begged to take ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... self-important, possessed of an abnormal conceit, men of his type go ahead ruthlessly, ignoring the details, bent only on achieving the ultimate. In Landover's case, he made the fatal error of underestimating the craftiness of Manuel Crust; he looked upon him as a blatant, ignorant ruffian of the stripe best known to him as a "beer saloon politician,"—and known only by hearsay, at that. He regarded himself as the master-politician and Crust as ...
— West Wind Drift • George Barr McCutcheon

... appeal much more strongly to the firing line than to Home. The Front distrusts politics, and especially the higher politics. That means the juggling and wire-pulling of the Chancelleries, and the Front has an uneasy conviction that at the subtleties and craftiness and cunning of the diplomatic game we cannot compete with "The Bosche." Hard knocks and straight fighting the Front does understand, and at that game are cheerfully confident of ...
— Raemaekers' Cartoons - With Accompanying Notes by Well-known English Writers • Louis Raemaekers

... is a fiend for subtle craftiness, evolved a plan whereby we might worm the information from him. And so I caused Hor Vastus to be harnessed in the metal of a Zodangan soldier and chained in Parthak's cell beside him. For fifteen days ...
— The Gods of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... craftiness planned and a malice unfair, Improvising a scare unsubstantial as air— Now it's "war," now "disease," and the world must prepare For the death of, say, GOULD, or a ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Volume 102, March 12, 1892 • Various

... this which I have exhibited to you. Don't you see the subtlety of my action? Ninety-nine persons in a hundred would say: "No man could be such a fool as to put Valmont on his own track, and then place in Valmont's hands such striking evidence." But there comes in my craftiness. Of course, the rock you run up against will be Gibbes's incredulity. The first question he will ask you may be this: "Why did not Dacre come and borrow the money from me?" Now there you find a certain weakness in your chain of evidence. I knew perfectly well that Gibbes would ...
— The Triumphs of Eugene Valmont • Robert Barr

... at the same time the people in general were exceedingly exasperated by the violence of the eunuchs, and especially by the rapacity of Eusebius, the chief officer of the imperial bed-chamber. Therefore he treated all with craftiness. With some he dissembled; others he attached to himself by conferring obligations upon them, led by a desire for vainglory; but to all he manifested how he stood toward the heathen religion. And first, in order to slander Constantius and condemn him as cruel toward his ...
— A Source Book for Ancient Church History • Joseph Cullen Ayer, Jr., Ph.D.

... that the General Assembly was in session contrary to his will and acting directly in violation of his decree, he was filled with wrath. Having sent Hamilton to use policy and craftiness, and thereby gain time, he mustered an army of nearly 50,000 men, with which to punish the Covenanters. He also sent a fleet to co-operate with the land forces. Absolute subjugation was determined. These people must be despoiled of conscience, liberty, divine worship, religious rights—all that ...
— Sketches of the Covenanters • J. C. McFeeters

... Had she not so far discovered a certain craftiness in the character of the Two Diamond stray-man that would indicate ...
— The Two-Gun Man • Charles Alden Seltzer

... downright genius, defeating first-class players in jest. His attack was always impetuous and rigorous; his defense wise and cautious, preferably in an oblique direction; his concessions to his opponent full of refined, far-sighted calculation and murderous craftiness. With this, he made moves as though under the influence of some inner instinct, or inspiration; not pondering for more than four or five seconds and resolutely despising the ...
— Yama (The Pit) • Alexandra Kuprin

... grizzlies under similar conditions, and they have all shown the same shrewd, cool, craftiness. They appear to reason, to plan; their actions indicate forethought, premeditation. They seem to have not only the marvelous instinct of the animal world, but also an almost human power to think. They conserve their energy, bide their time, choose their ...
— A Mountain Boyhood • Joe Mills

... accompanied the Minister to Russia, William Pinkney, to St. Petersburg, as Secretary of the Legation of the United States. Residing there for two years, he acquired the formal manners of the Court of the Emperor Alexander, with a diplomatic craftiness which he always retained. He was a courteous presiding officer, as was thus oddly exemplified while he occupied the chair. The two Senators from the State of Arkansas pronounced the name of their State differently. Mr. King punctiliously observed the ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore

... not think for a moment, my dear Sir, that I was ever actually deceived in Theodore. Was it likely that I, who am by temperament and habit accustomed to read human visages like a book, was it likely, I say, that I would fail to see craftiness in those pale, shifty eyes, deceit in the weak, slobbering mouth, intemperance in the whole aspect of the shrunken, slouchy figure which I had, for my subsequent sorrow, so ...
— Castles in the Air • Baroness Emmuska Orczy

... lying on the table before him, and a small portion of its contents had fallen into his palm. He tossed the black grains into the fire, where they flashed for an instant, sending a pungent ball of white smoke into the room. 'Twas as though the craftiness of Satan had shown to him the embryo ...
— The Fifth of November - A Romance of the Stuarts • Charles S. Bentley

... answered, with a craftiness beyond his years. He told the literal truth, but not all the truth. No need to inform this critical stranger what was the crust that lay on top ...
— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray

... would decrease, the Bible would be undervalued through a superior regard to a different mode of revelation, and we should live, as it were, among the tombs. A morbid state of feeling would pervade our minds, and the world would be full of enchantments, necromancy, and cunning craftiness. Blessed be God for the silence of the dead! We are glad that our weak and foolish hearts, so prone to love the creature more than the Creator, are broken off, by the impenetrable veil of death, from all ...
— Catharine • Nehemiah Adams

... was lightened, and the next day appeared, Ra Harakhti arose, and one looked unto the other. And the youth spake with his elder brother, saying: "Wherefore earnest thou after me to slay me in craftiness, when thou didst not hear the words of my mouth? For I am thy brother in truth, and thou art to me as a father, and thy wife even as a mother: is it not so? Verily, when I was sent to bring for us corn, thy wife said to me, 'Come, stay with me'; for behold ...
— Egyptian Literature

... intelligent than the average of his kind, but his intelligence only emphasized the lowness of that kind. His eyes, close together and small, advertised cruelty and craftiness. A gee-string and a cartridge-belt were all the clothes he wore. The carved pearl-shell ornament that hung from nose to chin and impeded speech was purely ornamental, as were the holes in his ears mere utilities for carrying pipe and tobacco. His broken-fanged teeth were stained ...
— Adventure • Jack London

... rest of the house was wrapped in slumber on the first night of his stay at Southlook. It was as sketchily drawn as the one he had made of Hetty, and quite as wonderful in the matter of faithfulness, but utterly without the subtle something that made the other notable. The craftiness of the artist was there, but the touch of inspiration ...
— The Hollow of Her Hand • George Barr McCutcheon

... capable of conceiving, blinding paroxysms of passion, which for the time overmastered him, and which, if they found no ready outlet, transformed themselves into the more dangerous forces that worked through the instrumentality of his cool craftiness. ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... native genius for war, which made him, according to the estimation of modern critics, the greatest general of antiquity. He combined courage with discretion, and prudence with energy. He had an inventive craftiness, which led him to take unexpected routes. He profoundly studied the character of antagonists, and kept himself informed of the projects of his enemies. He had his spies at Rome, and was frequently seen in disguises in order to ...
— Ancient States and Empires • John Lord

... an old man stubbornly digging a field by himself. He toiled through the flaming hours, and what he lacked in strength was made up in the craftiness, malizia, born of long love of the soil. The ground was baked hard; but there was still a chance of rain, and the peasants were anxious not to miss it. Knowing this kind of labour, I looked on from my vine-wreathed arbour with admiration, ...
— Old Calabria • Norman Douglas

... the joiner, in his working clothes, is sitting at the same table, with a glass of Bavarian beer before him. His face shows that he understands what the world requires of a man if he is to attain his ends—namely, craftiness, ...
— The Dramatic Works of Gerhart Hauptmann - Volume I • Gerhart Hauptmann

... so, to use his own expression, he hates the sight of them, and enters his cot only because it offers him a trifle more shelter from rain and wind than a hedge. He must support his family, though he cannot do so, whence come beggary, deceit of all sorts, ending in fully developed craftiness. If he were so inclined, he yet has not the courage which makes of the more energetic of his class wholesale poachers and smugglers. But he pilfers when occasion offers, and teaches his children to lie and steal. His abject and submissive demeanour towards his wealthy neighbours ...
— The Condition of the Working-Class in England in 1844 - with a Preface written in 1892 • Frederick Engels

... steps of your throne; and when she is on the point of touching your sceptre, fling her back to the ground, quite gently and with infinite grace, saying to her: "Bravo!" and leaving her to expect success in the hereafter. The craftiness of this manoeuvre will prove a fine support to you in the employment of any means which it may please you to choose from your arsenal, for the object ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac

... I thought, when he came here a few days since and put a little hindrance in the way, 'Now, the devil's very busy; what a crafty being he is!' Ah, but see now. After all, he only outwits himself by his own craftiness. The Lord brings good out of Satan's evil. Well, now, let us proceed with our proper work." These words were followed by a hearty cheer from the assenting crowd, and then all listened attentively while the good man gave a plain, practical, faithful, ...
— Amos Huntingdon • T.P. Wilson

... said he, "the author may show himself to be an astronomer, or a skilled cosmographer, or musician, or one versed in affairs of state, and sometimes he will have a chance of coming forward as a magician if he likes. He can set forth the craftiness of Ulysses, the piety of AEneas, the valour of Achilles, the misfortunes of Hector, the treachery of Sinon, the friendship of Euryalus, the generosity of Alexander, the boldness of Caesar, the clemency and truth ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

... dollars for her pig; but the old woman would not take less than eighteen; so instead of giving that he offered the four men billeted with me the sixteen dollars to steal it for him, in return for the old lady's craftiness, as he had offered quite the fair value. The deed was done that very night, the pig being conveyed out of sight to the mess room; and in the morning, when the old lady had as usual warmed the pig's breakfast, she found to her surprise the ...
— The Autobiography of Sergeant William Lawrence - A Hero of the Peninsular and Waterloo Campaigns • William Lawrence

... who had lived through tragedy but that had been long ago. Since then he had only known the things of the world. He had seen struggles and tricks and paltry craftiness. He had known of women caught in traps of folly and passion and weakness and had learned how terror taught them to lie and shift and even show abnormal cleverness. Above all he knew exactly what the world would say if a poor wretch of a girl told a story ...
— Robin • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... that the face of the Chinaman underwent a rapid change. The look of craftiness, treachery, and greed swept over it again. This time the yellow man's hand unmistakably reached ...
— Triple Spies • Roy J. Snell

... East Wind has a remarkable stability; as an invader of the high latitudes lying under the tumultuous sway of his great brother, the Wind of the West, he is extremely difficult to dislodge, by the reason of his cold craftiness and profound duplicity. ...
— The Mirror of the Sea • Joseph Conrad

... worst features of the religious decadence of the Middle Ages was the craftiness of such spurious types of men as those whom Chaucer painted in the Pardoner and the Somonour, and Charles Reade depicted in the peripatetic "cripples" of "The Cloister and the Hearth." Chaucer wrote in the true spirit of comedy mores corrigere ridendo, but Langland, his contemporary, ...
— Life in a Medival City - Illustrated by York in the XVth Century • Edwin Benson

... victims of sin ere the passions of the heart manifested their presence; and their hearts have quivered from the sting of remorse ere they felt the perfidious lurings of pleasure. Many have received from sin that doleful experience, that premature craftiness, which, far from enlightening the mind, obscures and blinds it,—which, far from fortifying the will, enfeebles ...
— Serious Hours of a Young Lady • Charles Sainte-Foi

... told him the truth. Every flaw in her masquerading now presented itself to him and he was compelled to laugh at his own simplicity. Caution, after all, was the largest component part of his makeup; the craftiness of the hunted was deeply rooted in his being. He saw a very serious side to the adventure. Stretching himself upon the cot in the corner of the room he gave himself ...
— Beverly of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon

... during a battle. When the report of guns was heard and the other men of his company got grimly into line and went forward, something happened to his legs and he wanted to run away. So great was the desire in him that craftiness grew in his brain. Watching his chance, he pretended to have been shot and fell to the ground, and when the others had gone on crept away and hid himself. He found it was not impossible to disappear altogether and reappear in another place. ...
— Poor White • Sherwood Anderson

... not been long in the land, and the trouble so far had been to seek redress. Hence the Americans felt keenly the position taken by the Highlanders. On the other hand the Highlanders had viewed the matter from a different standpoint. They did not realize the craftiness of Governor Martin in compelling them to take the oath of allegiance, and they felt bound by what they considered was a voluntary act, and binding with all the sacredness of religion. They had ever been taught to keep their promises, and a liar was a greater criminal ...
— An Historical Account of the Settlements of Scotch Highlanders in America • J. P. MacLean

... later that they heard someone striding over the porch, and the man they assumed to be the walking delegate entered. He was not of the usual stamp, but appeared intent on his errand. Save for a certain air of craftiness, he was representative and intelligent. He was quietly dressed, and gave the distinct impression that he had come up from the mines, and had known a hammer ...
— The Plunderer • Roy Norton

... his mortal enemy, and meditated already withdrawing her interests from the common fund. Incapable of observing the difference that a Creole nature placed between his mother-in-law and other women, Paul was far from suspecting her craftiness. The Creole nature is apart from all others; it derives from Europe by its intellect, from the tropics by the illogical violence of its passions, from the East by the apathetic indifference with which it does, ...
— The Marriage Contract • Honore de Balzac

... I had met with him and had had a sample of his craftiness. I was out shooting, after a fall of snow, and had crossed the open fields to the edge of the brushy hollow back of the old mill. As my head rose to a view of the hollow I caught sight of a fox trotting at long range down the other side, in line ...
— Wild Animals I Have Known • Ernest Thompson Seton

... David was his equal physically and his superior mentally, but the fear of David and of David's good standing kept him from venturing out in the open; so from cover he sought by all the arts known to craftiness to harass the younger boy, whose patience this test tried ...
— David Dunne - A Romance of the Middle West • Belle Kanaris Maniates

... made efforts to visit him, but he refused to be seen that day. However, he ordered a good lodging to be given them and had them told that he would grant them audience in three days. But Diego Veloso and Blas Ruyz—either by their former knowledge of the country, or actuated by later craftiness, proceeding from their interpretation of that suspicious delay—visiting a beautiful Indian woman of the king's house, were secretly told by her that, since she was admitted to and even desired in the affairs of that usurper, she knew that he was intending to have them all killed. ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XVI, 1609 • H.E. Blair

... for a long time after this, and it was evident that he was seriously considering the matter. The words of the detective had made an impression upon him, but with the craftiness of an old offender, he was debating a plan by which he might turn his admissions into account for himself. At length he ...
— The Burglar's Fate And The Detectives • Allan Pinkerton



Words linked to "Craftiness" :   deceitfulness, crafty, perspicaciousness, perspicacity, shrewdness, disingenuousness, astuteness



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