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Falsehood   /fˈælshˌʊd/   Listen
Falsehood

noun
1.
A false statement.  Synonyms: falsity, untruth.
2.
The act of rendering something false as by fraudulent changes (of documents or measures etc.) or counterfeiting.  Synonym: falsification.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Falsehood" Quotes from Famous Books



... good, quiet family, and their meals are excellent. I consider myself fortunate in all this. I feel assured that the Republicans, who, to cover up their own perfidy and neglect, have used every villanous falsehood in their power to injure me—I fear they have more than succeeded, but if their day of reckoning does not come in this world, it will surely in the next. * * ...
— Behind the Scenes - or, Thirty years a slave, and Four Years in the White House • Elizabeth Keckley

... Mary clinging to his arm. "Father Corraine," said Shon, "it is my duty to arrest this man; but I cannot do it, would not do it, if he came and offered his arms for the steel. I'll take the wrong of this now, sir, and such shame as there is in that falsehood on my shoulders. And she here and I, and this man too, I doubt not, will carry your sin—as you call it—to ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... bitter smile again flitted across the old man's lips; he made no response to her words, but in the one look which his hollow eyes east on her, he seemed to read the falsehood of her assertions. ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 3, August, 1850. • Various

... Mr. Haynes, and he reported to a Union Soldier that Colonel Boone was a rebel of the deepest dye, and further said that he had a company of Texas Rangers hidden, and intended to "clean out the country." The Lieutenant to whom this deliberate falsehood was told, sent fifteen soldiers to the home of A.G. Boone to confiscate his property and to burn him out if they found indications that ...
— The Second William Penn - A true account of incidents that happened along the - old Santa Fe Trail • William H. Ryus

... explain, but he was in a passion, and gave me a blow. The lady said something to him about his improper conduct, and he said that I was such a careless little rascal, that he lost all patience with me. That hurt me a great deal more than the blow. It was a falsehood, and he knew it; but he wanted to excuse himself. I felt that I was going into a passion, too, but I thought of what you are always telling me about patience and forbearance, and I kept down my passion; I know he was sorry for it after, from the way he ...
— Words of Cheer for the Tempted, the Toiling, and the Sorrowing • T. S. Arthur

... entertain the idea of marriage; and I have given up thinking of him as a lover. I am telling you the truth, and you have no right to disbelieve me; I have kept my word to you, and you have never detected me in a falsehood. I should not only not encourage, I should carefully avoid, any intercourse with Philip on any other footing than of quiet friendship. You may think that I am unable to keep my resolutions; but at least you ought not ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot

... Philadelphia and Newark, Trueman changes trains and goes to a public square where he addresses the populace. As he nears New York the enthusiasm of the crowds abates. In Newark the Plutocratic missionaries have spread the seeds of falsehood and have made such telling use of coercive threats that the people are actually hostile to Trueman and his party, deeming them Anarchists. The protection of the police is needed to prevent the most violent of the men from attacking the speakers. In the attempt ...
— The Transgressors - Story of a Great Sin • Francis A. Adams

... is believed that this expedition is instigated and set on foot chiefly by foreigners who dare to make our shores the scene of their guilty and hostile preparations against a friendly power and seek by falsehood and misrepresentation to seduce our own citizens, especially the young and inconsiderate, into their wicked schemes—an ungrateful return for the benefits conferred upon them by this people in permitting them to make our country an asylum from oppression and in flagrant abuse ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Volume - V, Part 1; Presidents Taylor and Fillmore • James D. Richardson

... that it does not preach Christ crucified and risen again. It preaches Mary, whom it proclaims from the lips of thousands of lecherous priests to be of perpetual virginity. And it is by its deliberate falsehood and deceit, as well as by its misrepresentation, that the Roman Catholic Church in South America has not only not taught Christianity, but has directly fostered deception and untruth of character." [Footnote: Missions in South America. Robert ...
— Through Five Republics on Horseback • G. Whitfield Ray

... our superiors in the art of spreading plausible reports. Acting together 'like one man,' a falsehood from head-quarters is at once disseminated from Richmond to New-Orleans, and the North is promptly victimized. At present their game is to make us discredit their own forces, having learned that our belief in the extent of their army is only a stimulus to Northern exertions. The truth ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2 No 4, October, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... frightened or say carelessly, "Oh, I thought this was not so accurate.'' This famine of conscience, this indifference to truth, does far-reaching damage in our profession. I assert that it does immensely greater harm than obvious falsehood, because, indeed, the unvarnished lie is much more easily discoverable than the probable truth which is still untruth. Moreover, lies come generally from people with regard to whom one is, for one reason or another, already cautious, while these insinuating approximations are ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden

... his "axiom in morals and politics" can be found so monstrous a combination of ignorance, injustice, falsehood, and impiety? Ignorant of the meaning of an "axiom"; denying the truths of science; falsifying history; setting above the Constitution the most odious theory of tyranny, long before exploded; scoffing at the rules of justice and sentiments ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 88, February, 1865 • Various

... the minister who wrote it, and who, in the absence of personal experience, and amidst all the conflicting testimony or misrepresentation by which a person at a distance is ever apt to be assailed and misled, has still been able to separate the truth from falsehood, and to arrive at a rational, a christian, and a just opinion, on a subject so fraught with difficulties, so involved in uncertainty, ...
— Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central • Edward John Eyre

... given similar reports, and even the ancient Egyptians have left records of similar occurrences. These conflicting reports have led to the belief, on the part of those who did not understand the nature of the phenomena, that these things were "all imagination" and fancy, if indeed not rank falsehood and imposture. But the Yogis know better than this. They know that underneath all these varying reports there is a common ground of truth, which will be apparent to anyone investigating the matter. They know that all of these reports (except ...
— A Series of Lessons in Raja Yoga • Yogi Ramacharaka

... the final, the fatal sentence. At that instant the grand master advanced; his gesture implored silence; judges and people gazed in awestruck apprehension. In a calm, clear voice Du Molay spoke: "Before heaven and earth, on the verge of death, where the least falsehood bears like an intolerable weight upon the soul, I protest that we have richly deserved death, not on account of any heresy or sin of which ourselves or our order have been guilty, but because we have yielded, to save our ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various

... be put to this unworthy policy of falsehood and distrust, of fault-finding and provocation. Henceforth it must be replaced by an open and honest policy leading to the complete mutual confidence of the peoples of Russia. Only as the result of such a trust can there be formed an honest and lasting union of the ...
— Ten Days That Shook the World • John Reed

... a slave, and forced, against her will, to join herself to him and to follow his fortunes. He had never admitted her into his confidence, but had induced her, from time to time, to act as he desired by telling her any falsehood which would serve the purpose. She consequently was not bound to him by any ties of honor or affection, and felt herself at liberty to answer freely all questions which were put to her by the judges. Her testimony was ...
— Peter the Great • Jacob Abbott

... with successful blasts? Who hateth me but for my happiness? Or who is honour'd now but for his wealth? Rather had I, a Jew, be hated thus, Than pitied in a Christian poverty; For I can see no fruits in all their faith, But malice, falsehood, and excessive pride, Which methinks fits not their profession. Haply some hapless man hath conscience, And for his conscience lives in beggary. They say we are a scatter'd nation: I cannot tell; but we have ...
— The Jew of Malta • Christopher Marlowe

... to witness, you who have reared my infancy, who dispose of my life, who see my tears. I swear by that Heaven which hears me, by the sea which I am going to pass, by the air I breathe, and which I never sullied by a falsehood.' ...
— Paul and Virginia • Bernardin de Saint Pierre

... down her cheeks and fell upon her hands. She was startled by the falling of these warm, glowing drops. She was thinking of Lynar, of the distant, warmly-desired one, to whom she would gladly have devoted her whole existence, but to whom she could belong only through falsehood. She thought it would be nobler and greater to renounce him, that her love might be consecrated by her abnegation, while actually devoting her life to the duties enjoined by the laws and the Church. But these thoughts filled her bosom with a nameless sorrow, and it was ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach

... magnificent theatrical display that had so long dazzled my imagination. I was initiated into the shameful mysteries of cabal and intrigue, and taught the precious secrets of Pope and Cardinals. On every side I saw falsehood, treachery, and duplicity welcomed as the ablest servitors of truth, the grandest professions assumed as an excuse for the most vulgar villainy, ambition glozed over by degrading humility, and sensuality ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 2 • Various

... give me my manuscripts?' I said again, anxious to put an end to the interview, and disgusted with the fellow's falsehood. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. September, 1863, No. LXXI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... of the things which one feels to be derogatory to an age of general progress. No longer are men permitted to kill each other in vindication of opinion, but how mournful to witness persecution by inuendo, vituperation, and even falsehood. Individuals and classes are seen bombarding each other in vile, abusive, and certainly most unchristian language, all ostensibly in the name of a religion which has for a fundamental principle, an utter repudiation of strife! Whether any amendment is to be looked ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 429 - Volume 17, New Series, March 20, 1852 • Various

... outbreaks in praise of her beauty and worth, and eager queries to me whether I did not think her a perfect paragon? I could only answer with faint compliments or vague approval, feeling all the while that I was disappointing my poor ardent fellow, and cursing inwardly that revolt against flattery and falsehood into which I sometimes frantically rush. Why should I not say, "Yes dear Hal, thy wife is a paragon; her singing is delightful, her hair and shape are beautiful;" as I might have said by a little common stretch of politeness? Why could I not ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray

... after they left, and so I thought I would get ready and come, even if it were rather late," said Beatrice glibly, wondering if Sapphira had ever worn a black-and-yellow dress, and if so, might not her historic falsehood be traced to ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1902 to 1903 • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... was coming. He was sure to do what was right, and to return to his dearly-loved wife as soon as ever he could. And, though scarce acknowledging the fact to herself, her husband's return involved such a humiliating explanation of truth concealed, if not of positive falsehood, that Sybilla dared not even think of it. Whenever the long-parted wife mused on the joy of meeting—of looking once more into the beloved face, and being lifted up like a child to cling round his neck with her fairy arms, for Angus was a very ...
— Olive - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik, (AKA Dinah Maria Mulock)

... voice ring out and over the earth" James Thomson Gifts James Thomson Amynta Gilbert Elliot "O Nancy! wilt Thou go with Me" Thomas Percy Cavalier's Song Robert Cunninghame-Graham "My Heart is a Lute" Anne Barnard Song, "Had I a heart for falsehood framed" Richard Brinsley Sheridan Meeting George Crabbe "O Were my Love you Lilac Fair" Robert Burns "Bonnie Wee Thing" Robert Burns Rose Aylmer Walter Savage Landor "Take back the Virgin Page" Thomas Moore "Believe me, if all Those Endearing Young Charms" Thomas ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 4 (of 4) • Various

... assigned for the advance of our troops by the commanding general had been seriously doubted by me, and there was every reason to suppose that the troops of the United States, their commander having had time to ascertain the truth or falsehood of the information upon which they had been marched to Nacogdoches, would be either there in perfect accordance with the principles admitted to be just in his conference with the Secretary of State by the Mexican minister himself, or were already withdrawn in consequence of the impressive ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Andrew Jackson • Andrew Jackson

... enemies' designs, might take effectual measures to circumvent them. He determined to resort to deceit, or, as he called it, stratagem; nor did he probably have any distinct perception of the wrongfulness of such a mode of proceeding. The demon of war upholds and justifies falsehood and treachery, in all its forms, on the part of his votaries. He always applauds a forgery, a false pretense, or a lie: he ...
— Cyrus the Great - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... the very man who murdered them. In such a case it required perhaps either Richard or the arch-fiend himself to tempt her successfully; but in a less critical moment, a far less subtle and audacious seducer would have sufficed. Cressida is another modification of vanity, weakness, and falsehood, drawn in stronger colors. The world contains many Lady Annes and Cressidas, polished and refined externally, whom chance and vanity keep right, whom chance and vanity lead wrong, just as it may happen. ...
— Characteristics of Women - Moral, Poetical, and Historical • Anna Jameson

... chastised," answered Leander, still counterfeiting the parrot's voice; "moreover, she will let you know the great desire that stranger had to be admitted into this palace, that he might convince you of the falsehood of those ideas which you have ...
— The Little Lame Prince - And: The Invisible Prince; Prince Cherry; The Prince With The Nose - The Frog-Prince; Clever Alice • Miss Mulock—Pseudonym of Maria Dinah Craik

... a Saracenic sultan had collected a quantity of books for the service of the philosophers of his sect, he was shamed to see that Christians had less zeal for getting instructed in the truth than infidels had for getting themselves made dexterous in falsehood; so much so that, after his return to France, he had search made in the abbeys for all the genuine works of St. Augustin, St. Ambrose, St. Jerome, St. Gregory, and other orthodox teachers, and, having caused copies ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume II. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot

... deeply on what she had told me as to the virtue of the females of her race. How singular that virtue must be which was kept pure and immaculate by the possessor, whilst indulging in habits of falsehood and dishonesty. I had always thought the gypsy females extraordinary beings. I had often wondered at them, their dress, their manner of speaking, and, not least, at their names; but, until the present day, I had been unacquainted with the most extraordinary ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow

... atmosphere of Europe was mephitic with falsehood, and certainly the gales which blew from the English court at the accession of James were not fragrant, but De Rosny had himself come over from France under false pretences. He had been charged by his master to represent Henry's childish ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... to the Roman citizens, who had accompanied them, in reliance on his protection. He immediately seizes a great quantity of corn and provisions, cruelly tortures them, and then puts them to death, sends messengers throughout the entire state of the Aedui, and rouses them completely by the same falsehood concerning the slaughter of their knights and nobles; he earnestly advises them to avenge, in the same manner as he did, the wrongs which they ...
— "De Bello Gallico" and Other Commentaries • Caius Julius Caesar

... unions are not arranged upon a regular organized SYSTEM: there is a fiction of attachment with us, and there is a consolation in the deceit ("the homage," according to the old mot of Rochefoucauld) "which vice pays to virtue"; for the very falsehood shows that the virtue exists somewhere. We once heard a furious old French colonel inveighing against the chastity of English demoiselles: "Figurez-vous, sir," said he (he had been a prisoner in England), "that these women come down to dinner in low dresses, and walk ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray

... dismissed from muster, after being informed that the business of receiving the funds would be immediately commenced in the steerage. The three gamblers were not punished, except by the mortification of the exposure, even by the loss of their marks, though Wilton was confined in the brig one hour for each falsehood he had uttered. Mr. Lowington knew that at least a dozen of the boys were guilty of gambling; and as the matter now came up for the first time, he did not deem it expedient to punish those who had been ...
— Outward Bound - Or, Young America Afloat • Oliver Optic

... dare not; by the gods, You dare not. All your family combin'd In one damn'd falsehood, to outdo Castalio, Dare ...
— The Orphan - or, The Unhappy Marriage • Thomas Otway

... sternly, "falsehood and impudence will not help you in this case, and I wish to hear no more. I have only to say that we have evidence enough against you to insure a conviction, and your only hope lies in making your ...
— The Burglar's Fate And The Detectives • Allan Pinkerton

... foolish words? what threats be these I hear? What noise of arms? who dares these tumults move? Am I so honored? stand you so in fear? Where is your late obedience? where your love? Of Godfrey's falsehood who can witness bear? Who dare or will these accusations prove? Perchance you look I should entreaties bring, Sue for your ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso

... Elza. And after telling and explaining all this to the men, I shall go to Elza, give her the flowers, and tell her that Ulrich sent them to her, and that his last word was a love-greeting for her. God, forgive me this falsehood! But Elza loves him, and it will gladden her heart. She will preserve this bouquet to her wedding- day, and she will not notice that I kept one flower from it for myself. It is the flower which he kissed; it shall be mine. I suppose, good God, that I may take it, and that it is ...
— Andreas Hofer • Lousia Muhlbach

... where you are. I sent a message to her hours ago. She gave a very good report of you, Jake; says you're an obedient lad and that you never have told her a falsehood." ...
— The Circular Study • Anna Katharine Green

... followed her companion into the ill-favoured little tavern with a weary step and a heavy heart. Some unerring instinct told her, no doubt, that she was giving all and taking nothing, offering gold for silver, truth for falsehood, love and devotion for a mere liking, rapidly ...
— M. or N. "Similia similibus curantur." • G.J. Whyte-Melville

... by motives, it is not a subject for praise or blame, reward or punishment. Religions, therefore, which promise heaven for belief and hell for unbelief, are utterly unphilosophical. They are self-condemned. Truth invites free study. Falsehood shuns investigation, and denounces that liberty of thought which is ...
— Flowers of Freethought - (Second Series) • George W. Foote

... chemistry, and which aimed chiefly at the discovery of the philosopher's stone, of a universal solvent, and of the elixir of life; it has been defined to be "an art without art, which has its beginning in falsehood, its middle in toil, ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... true to the traditions of his home-life. Even between village and village the usual restraints of public morality are not always recognized. What would be called theft or robbery at home is called a successful raid or conquest if directed against distant villages; and what would be falsehood or trickery in private life is honored by the name of policy and diplomacy if successful against strangers. On the other hand, the rules of hospitality applied only to people of other villages, ...
— India: What can it teach us? - A Course of Lectures Delivered before the University Of Cambridge • F. Max Mueller

... disgrace? No, I was obliged to tell a falsehood and represent that I was going to Canada on business. I have been in constant dread that my crime would get into the papers and she would hear it. Poor mother! I believe that ...
— The Erie Train Boy • Horatio Alger

... work is not really by the apostle, we must admit a fraud of which the author convicts himself. Now, although the ideas of the time respecting literary honesty differed essentially from ours, there is no example in the apostolic world of a falsehood of this kind. Besides, not only does the author wish to pass for the apostle John, but we see clearly that he writes in the interest of this apostle. On each page he betrays the desire to fortify his ...
— The Life of Jesus • Ernest Renan

... it was marked, and the complicated system of small deceptions, which it consequently required. The King, who was never so thoroughly happy or at home as when elaborating the ingredients of a composite falsehood, now busily employed himself in his cabinet. He measured off in various letters to the Regent, to the three nobles, to Egmont alone, and to Granvelle, certain proportionate parts of his whole plan, ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... and their aiders and abettors, you are therefore hereby commanded forthwith to arrest and imprison in any fort or military prison in your command, the editors, proprietors, and publishers of the aforesaid newspapers, and all such persons as, after public notice has been given of the falsehood of said publication, print and publish the same with intent to give aid and comfort to the enemy; and you will hold the persons so arrested in close custody until they can be brought to trial before a military ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln

... consequences which no one can mistake. And yet again, has History any more unmistakable lesson than that "for every false word or unrighteous deed, for cruelty and oppression, for lust or vanity, the price has to be paid at last"? Froude was right. "Injustice and falsehood may be long-lived, but doomsday comes at last to them, in French Revolutions and other ...
— Prime Ministers and Some Others - A Book of Reminiscences • George W. E. Russell

... chill of fear, possessed his spirit. The conduct of the man with the chin-beard, the terms of the letter, and the explosion of the early morning, fitted together like parts in some obscure and mischievous imbroglio. Evil was certainly afoot; evil, secrecy, terror, and falsehood were the conditions and the passions of the people among whom he had begun to move, like a blind puppet; and he who began as a puppet, his experience told him, was often doomed to perish ...
— The Dynamiter • Robert Louis Stevenson and Fanny van de Grift Stevenson

... his controversy is with Mather, not with me. If Rule did not belong to the Congregation of North Boston, when Mather first visited her, his language is deceptive, and his apology, for meddling with the case, founded in falsehood. I make no such charge, and have no such belief. The Reviewer seems to have been led to place Cotton Mather in his own light—in fact, to falsify his language—on this point, by what is said of another Minister's having ...
— Salem Witchcraft and Cotton Mather - A Reply • Charles W. Upham

... for some reason, my father was strangely ill at ease. Like someone detected in a falsehood, he looked restlessly about him. For the moment his adroitness seemed to have left him. He made a helpless ...
— The Unspeakable Gentleman • John P. Marquand

... been called a magnificent lie! Mrs. Stowe's "living dramatic reality" is nothing more than an interesting falsehood; nor ought to be offered, as an equivalent for truth, the genius that pervades her pages; rather it is to be lamented that the rich gifts of God should ...
— Aunt Phillis's Cabin - Or, Southern Life As It Is • Mary H. Eastman

... that it is true!" she exclaimed. "What right have you to say such a thing, as if you knew Merton so well, and had weighed him in an infallible balance and found him wanting! I have heard nothing but malicious tittle-tattle, a falsehood beneath contempt, set afloat by some enemy of Merton's. If I could have thought it true for one moment I should never cease to despise myself. Have you forgotten how you blazed out against me for speaking my mind about Miss Starbrow when she ...
— Fan • Henry Harford

... of Wisdom.—But it is not an easy thing to tell the truth of human life, and nothing but the truth. The best of fiction-writers fall to falsehood now and then; and it is only by honest labor and sincere strife for the ideal that they contrive in the main to fulfil the purpose of their art. But the writer of fiction must be not only honest and sincere; he must be wise as well. ...
— A Manual of the Art of Fiction • Clayton Hamilton

... been true. The petition was prefaced by a personal letter containing them. Though a supplication in form, the request is unlike his father's humble and almost cringing papers, being rather a demand for justice than a petition for favor; it is unlike them in another respect, because it contains a falsehood, or at least an utterly misleading half-truth: a statement that he had shortened his leave because ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. I. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane

... had never ceased representing to all the eminent schoolmasters in England the absurd tyranny of poisoning the hour of permitted pleasure by keeping future misery before the children's eyes, and tempting them by bribery or falsehood to evade it. "Bob Sumner," said he, "however, I have at length prevailed upon. I know not, indeed, whether his tenderness was persuaded, or his reason convinced, but the effect will always be the same. Poor Dr. Sumner died, however, ...
— Anecdotes of the late Samuel Johnson, LL.D. - during the last twenty years of his life • Hester Lynch Piozzi

... from being the truth; but the Indian Sagamore considered that every falsehood and stratagem was allowable, and even meritorious, that could further a desired object, especially if that object was so undoubtedly good in itself as that which now engrossed his thoughts and wishes. He did not know that it is sin to 'do evil ...
— The Pilgrims of New England - A Tale Of The Early American Settlers • Mrs. J. B. Webb

... required form on the eighteenth of August. "You will observe here and there," he remarked in his preface, "some severity appears. I have not fortitude enough always to bear with calmness calumnies which necessarily include me, as a principal agent in the measures censured, of the falsehood of which I have the most unqualified consciousness. I trust I shall always be able to bear as I ought imputations of errors of judgment; but I acknowledge that I can not be entirely patient under charges ...
— Washington and the American Republic, Vol. 3. • Benson J. Lossing

... met she felt that they were sealing a treaty with dishonour. That his kiss should come to mean that to her! It was unbearable—worse than any personal pain—the thought of dragging him down to falsehood through her weakness. ...
— The Fruit of the Tree • Edith Wharton

... said he, drawing away his hand, "Rowland Lester is not the one to desert a friend in the day of darkness and the hour of need. Be silent I say!—My brother, my poor brother, you tell me, has been murdered. I will see justice done to him: but, Aram! Fie! fie! it is a name that would whisper falsehood to the loudest accusation. Go, Walter! go! I do not blame you!—you may be right—a murdered father is a dread and awful memory to a son! What wonder that the thought warps your judgment? But go! Eugene was to me both a guide and a blessing; a father in wisdom, a son in love. I cannot ...
— Eugene Aram, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... There was neither man nor woman nor girl in Spain who would believe her innocent against such evidence. The world might have believed Don John, if he had lived, because the world had loved him and trusted him, and could never have heard falsehood in his voice; but it would not believe her though she were dying, and though she should swear upon the most sacred and true things. The world would turn from her with an unbelieving laugh, and she was to be left alone in her dishonour, and people ...
— In The Palace Of The King - A Love Story Of Old Madrid • F. Marion Crawford

... "And as long as he confines himself to them no great harm is done; but if a man once gets into the habit of departing from the truth for the sake of amusing his hearers, he may not stop there, and will, very likely, tell a falsehood of a different character whenever it may suit ...
— Marmaduke Merry - A Tale of Naval Adventures in Bygone Days • William H. G. Kingston

... mother. Upon her personal exhibition of truth, justice, virtue, &c., depends the same moral elements in the character of her child. In the nursery we receive our first lessons in virtue or in vice, in honesty or dishonesty, in truth or in falsehood, in purity or in corruption. The full-grown man is the matured child morally as well as physically and intellectually. The same may be said of the spiritual formation and growth of the child. Spiritual culture belongs eminently to the nursery. There the pious parent ...
— The Christian Home • Samuel Philips

... pedantically truthful, Molly. Besides, your manner shows when you speak truth and when you speak falsehood, without troubling yourself to use words. I knew exactly what your "I don't know" meant. I never consider myself bound to be truthful, so I beg we may ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... struggled against the terror of its first spectral appearance, and had conquered my fears,—why was I now shaken from my self-control? What was the cause? Voices, merely! Voices behind a wall that spoke of death and falsehood,—voices belonging to persons I did not know and could not see—like the voices of the world which delight in uttering scandals and cruelties and which never praise so much as they condemn. Voices merely! ...
— The Life Everlasting: A Reality of Romance • Marie Corelli

... civilization one great lecture-room, from which no reading man can escape, and the only defence against progress is stolid preoccupation with trade or trifles. Yet this persistency is holding the breath, and can no more be continued in the mind than that in the body. Blundering and falsehood become intolerable to the blunderers; they must return to thought, and that is proper in a single direction, is approached by ten thousand avenues toward the One. It is religious, not ignorance or dogma. We cannot think without exploration ...
— The Atlantic Monthly , Volume 2, No. 14, December 1858 • Various

... of religion as well as elsewhere, we are only openly demanding what our opponents have tacitly acknowledged in practice (e. g.> in allegorical interpretation) from time immemorial. God has endowed us with reason in order that we should by it distinguish truth from falsehood. ...
— History Of Modern Philosophy - From Nicolas of Cusa to the Present Time • Richard Falckenberg

... which was before the world began. Truth which is, and truth, O Nanuk! which will remain. By reflection it cannot be attained, how much soever the attention be fixed. A hundred wisdoms, even a hundred thousand, not one accompanies the dead. How can truth be told, how can falsehood be unravelled? O Nanuk! by following the will of God, ...
— The Ethnology of the British Colonies and Dependencies • Robert Gordon Latham

... Don Beltran de Cuchilla for the ransom of the Alfaqui's daughter of Xixona, our dearest Rebecca was no more dead than you and I; and it was in his rage and fury against Ivanhoe that Isaac told that cavalier the falsehood which caused the knight so much pain and such a prodigious deal of bloodshed to the Moors: and who knows, trivial as it may seem, whether it was not that very circumstance which caused the destruction in Spain of the ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray

... doing?' she said, with an eagerness that seemed enough to consume her like a fire. 'In what is that man assisting him, who never looks at me without an inscrutable falsehood in his eyes? If you are honourable and faithful, I don't ask you to betray your friend. I ask you only to tell me, is it anger, is it hatred, is it pride, is it restlessness, is it some wild fancy, is it love, what is it, that ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens

... famous controversy with this Faustus, and wrote against him thirty-three books. The results of Augustine's studies were that he was able to refute their attacks on Holy Scripture which they said had undergone serious changes, and to see the falsehood of their main postulate that good proceeds from a good principle and evil from an evil principle; and also to recognize the futility of their objection that the Christians spoke of a human form in God. Against this sect his principal writings are "On the Manners and Customs ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 3 of 8 • Various

... art thou who dost deny my words? 655 Truth sits upon the lips of dying men, And falsehood, while I lived, was far from mine. I tell thee, prick'd upon this arm deg. I bear deg.658 That seal which Rustum to my mother gave, That she might prick it on the ...
— Matthew Arnold's Sohrab and Rustum and Other Poems • Matthew Arnold

... regards Hilyar's account of Porter's loss. Again, Hilyar distinctly states that the Essex was twice on fire, yet James (p. 418) utterly denies this, thereby impliedly accusing the British captain of falsehood. There is really no need of the corroboration of Porter's letter, but he has it most fully in the "Life of Farragut," p. 37: "The men came rushing up from below, many with their clothes burning, which were torn from them as quickly as possible, and those for whom this could not be done were told ...
— The Naval War of 1812 • Theodore Roosevelt

... is quoted by Burke in the "Letters on a Regicide Peace," from a play written or adapted by Lewis Theobald, "The Double Falsehood" ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin

... the Intelligent let fall in a former speech some subtle or carefully worded innuendoes as to my character. I have only to say that his speech was a tissue of falsehood. I will trespass upon your patience further, to add that JONES is an infernal bummer and a sneak. If he is not, my fellow-citizens, why then I am. (Indignant cries of 'That's so!') My friends, you cannot doubt this reasoning. The facts are then conclusive. Either he is ...
— Punchinello, Vol. II., No. 34, November 19, 1870 • Various

... me out, I too should have been slain, although, as thou sayest, thou hast proved me and know me to be faithful and true! But thank thy snake, O Lomalindela, King of the Mashona, that Chia'gnosi saw the evil and falsehood that lurked in that black heart,"—pointing to the dead body of Machenga—"else would many another of thy friends—myself among the number, perchance—have died before yon ...
— Through Veld and Forest - An African Story • Harry Collingwood

... extremities in the same pots and pans. Such a possibility was not pleasant to contemplate, but as I had found the word of these Indians to be always good, I believed I was safe. They were never false and they hated falsehood. True, they were cunning, but once their friend always their friend, through thick and thin. And the Chief had promised that I should not be eaten, either fried or stewed! Therefore I slept ...
— In The Amazon Jungle - Adventures In Remote Parts Of The Upper Amazon River, Including A - Sojourn Among Cannibal Indians • Algot Lange

... circumstances, as I said, he pleadeth against us at the bar of God. But there he meeteth with Jesus Christ, our Lord and Advocate, who entereth his plea against him, unravels all his reasons and arguments against us, and shows the guile and falsehood of them. He also pleadeth as to the nature of sin, as also to all those high aggravations, and proveth that neither the sin in itself, nor yet as joined with all its advantageous circumstances, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... Dolores, answering the word here, and foolishly feeling the involvement too great, and Constance too much concerned in it for her to confess to her uncle what had really happened. Indeed, the first falsehood held her to the second; and there was no more time, for Lord Rotherwood was coming out of his room further down the passage. And after the greetings, as she went downstairs before the two gentlemen, she was sure she heard Uncle Regie say, 'She's ...
— The Two Sides of the Shield • Charlotte M. Yonge

... arrived from the east side of the Colorado and told of some miners who had killed a squaw in a drunken brawl. He incited the tribe to follow and attack the three whites, who no doubt were the murderers. Their story of coming down the Grand Canon was impossible—no men had ever done that—and it was a falsehood designed to cover their guilt. Excited by a desire for revenge, a party stole after them, surrounded them in ambush and filled them with arrows. This was the tragic end of Dunn and ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, October, 1880 • Various

... manana at the expense of the Americans, and inducing her powerful enemy to refrain from striking a blow by means of terrifying rumors skilfully circulated through the so-called "yellow journals" of the great American cities, which readily published any falsehood that provided a sensation. At length, however, the last bogie appeared to be laid, and one week after the Riders reached Tampa a rumor of an immediate departure, more definite than any that had preceded it, flashed through the great camp: "Everything is ready, and to-morrow ...
— "Forward, March" - A Tale of the Spanish-American War • Kirk Munroe

... reasoning, not a saving faith, in that high doctrine of the coexistent, coequal Trinity. I did not then know—for of all church history I was ignorant—that its original object was not so much to establish a truth, as to detect and defeat a falsehood. The damnatory clauses, as they are called, did not startle me. I saw clearly the fact that God had made a revelation of himself to man, which revelation man was not at liberty to receive or to reject, and as without faith it is impossible to please God, and that alone ...
— Personal Recollections • Charlotte Elizabeth

... the coldness and falsehood of his enemies had failed to do, was accomplished by a few words of unaffected sympathy. These alone had power to wring tears from his firm manhood, and Chester led his little protege home with a ...
— The Old Homestead • Ann S. Stephens

... "It's a falsehood," shouted the man. "If I left out those screws it was because I was dazed—suffering from overwork—work forced upon me that I was not fit to do, but heaped upon me to save your pocket ...
— Will of the Mill • George Manville Fenn

... the Lord compelling him. He found, however, no ground or strength, but having a good conception of spiritual matters or religion, as far as could be the case in such a man, he saw nothing but untruth, falsehood, and deception in all that was done in relation to God and godly things, and great hypocrisy in the best persons with whom he was acquainted. Convinced of this, and seeing no better result, he remained in suspense, although he professed the doctrines of the Reformed, and was a member of ...
— Journal of Jasper Danckaerts, 1679-1680 • Jasper Danckaerts

... spring constant detraction, gossiping, tale-bearing, falsehood, anger, pride, malice, revenge, and ...
— An Essay on Slavery and Abolitionism - With reference to the duty of American females • Catharine E. Beecher

... popular phrase, derived from the Koranic "Truth is come, and falsehood is vanished: for falsehood is of short continuance" (chapt. xvii.). It is an equivalent of our adaptation from 1 Esdras iv. 41, "Magna est veritas et praevalebit." But the great question still remains, ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton

... I fancy," said Ratcliffe. "Two months since, with the King's approbation, the Countess of Clare became the affianced bride of Sir Aymer de Lacy; and Lord Darby's tale, as to her love for himself and Richard's treatment of them, is pure falsehood." ...
— Beatrix of Clare • John Reed Scott

... unconnected, and unreasoning, but not unreasonable talk. Men's argument, or rather arguing, and above all debating, he disliked. He had no turn for it. He was not combative, much less contentious. He was, however, warlike. Anything that he could destroy, any falsehood or injustice, he made for, not to discuss, but to expose and kill. He could not fence with his mind much less with his tongue, and had no love for the exploits of a nimble dialectic. He had no readiness either in thought or word for this; his way was slowly ...
— Spare Hours • John Brown

... Belzoni's Researches and Franklin's terrible American adventures, and they bring back tones of my father's voice. As an authority 'papa' was seldom invoked, except on very serious occasions, such as Griffith's audacity, Clarence's falsehood, or my obstinacy; and then the affair was formidable, he was judicial and awful, and, though he would graciously forgive on signs of repentance, he never was sympathetic. He had not married young, and there were forty years or more between him and his sons, so that he had left too far ...
— Chantry House • Charlotte M. Yonge

... to the bank. "How d'ye do, Miss Carew," he said. "I didn't see you until you called me." She looked at him; and he, convicted of a foolish falsehood, quailed. "There is a splendid view of the castle from here," he continued, to change the subject. "Miss Goff and I have ...
— Cashel Byron's Profession • George Bernard Shaw

... law of our will. We will not inquire now what secret relations shall one day bring together in an indissoluble unity of light, the good, the true, and the beautiful, and in a unity of darkness, evil, deformity, and falsehood. Let it suffice to have pointed out how a threefold aspiration leads man to God, under the guidance of the conscience, the understanding, and the feelings; and that a threefold rebellion estranges him from God, by sinking him ...
— The Heavenly Father - Lectures on Modern Atheism • Ernest Naville

... mockery, mimicry; simulation, impersonation, personation; representation &c. 554; semblance; copy &c. 21; assimilation. paraphrase, parody, take-off, lampoon, caricature &c. 21. plagiarism; forgery, counterfeit &c. (falsehood) 544; celluloid. imitator, echo, cuckoo|, parrot, ape, monkey, mocking bird, mime; copyist, copycat; plagiarist, pirate. V. imitate, copy, mirror, reflect, reproduce, repeat; do like, echo, reecho, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus

... efficacious formula, "I baptize thee in the name," etc.? Clearly the parson, with his mouth full of water, could not have done so at the instant of baptism, and if the sentence was spoken by any other person it was a falsehood. It must therefore have been spoken either before the minister distended his cheeks, or after he had exhausted them. In either case, according to the learned Dr. Sicklewit, the ceremony is utterly null and void of effect. ...
— The Fiend's Delight • Dod Grile

... enchanters they care not for prince or for peer, And gifts are but needlessly given; The wise tongue ne'er stumbleth for falsehood or fear, 'Tis the friend of the councils of Heaven! The years of the future are clouded and dark, Yet on thy fair forehead thy fate I ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 358, August 1845 • Various

... Third called Ben Franklin a bolshevik," retorted Roger. "The trouble is, truth and falsehood don't come laid out in black and white—Truth and Huntruth, as the wartime joke had it. Sometimes I thought Truth had vanished from the earth," he cried bitterly. "Like everything else, it was rationed by the governments. I taught myself to disbelieve half of what I read in the papers. I saw ...
— The Haunted Bookshop • Christopher Morley

... enterprising spirit of the new minister seemed to diffuse itself through all the operations of the war, and conquest everywhere attended the efforts of the British arms. Now appeared the fallacy of those maxims, and the falsehood of those assertions, by which former ministers had established, and endeavoured to excuse, the practices of corruption. The supposed disaffection, which had been insisted on as the source of parliamentary opposition, now entirely vanished; nor was it found necessary to use any sinister means ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett

... length convicted, and had judgment of death. But Sir Crisp Gascoyne, the lord mayor of London, who was nominally at the head of the commission for trying Squires, believed that she was the victim of falsehood and public prejudice. He resolved to subject the whole question to a searching investigation, and to obviate, if possible, the scandal to British institutions, of perpetrating a judicial murder, even though the victim should be among ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 450 - Volume 18, New Series, August 14, 1852 • Various

... towards the Buddhist heresy. The four elder sons would typify the princes of India refusing to respond to the exhortations of the Brahmans for the suppression of Buddhism, and hence themselves made blind to the true faith and their understandings darkened with Buddhist falsehood. But Parasurama, the youngest, killed his mother, that is, the Huns devastated India and slaughtered the Buddhists; in reward for this he was made invincible as the Huns were, and his mother, India, and his brothers, the indigenous princes, regained life and understanding, that is, returned to ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume IV of IV - Kumhar-Yemkala • R.V. Russell

... father. We are now, therefore, come to buy corn, having intrusted the care of our father, and the provision for our family, to Benjamin, our youngest brother; and if thou sendest to our house, thou mayst learn whether we are guilty of the least falsehood in what we say." ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus

... of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit!" he whispered, making the sign of the cross over her. "God guard you from evil, from every bad influence. . . . Be kind . . . honest . . . most of all, be honest! Never tell lies. God guard you from falsehood, from lying, even more ...
— The Most Interesting Stories of All Nations • Julian Hawthorne

... greatest admiration for St. John Hirst. Dwelling upon his good qualities he became seriously convinced of them; he had a mind like a torpedo, he declared, aimed at falsehood. Where should we all be without him and his like? Choked in weeds; Christians, bigots,—why, Rachel herself, would be a slave with a fan to sing songs to ...
— The Voyage Out • Virginia Woolf

... wrote in the cause of humanity against the abuses of tyranny and ignorance. "Where there is not complete proof of guilt," said he, "there let there be no condemnation," a maxim observed in England, but not in France. "What is not full truth," is a saying of his, "is full falsehood." It was his hope, his prayer, that he might live to see the injustice of the French laws swept away. That he was not destined to see. He was a kind professor to all his scholars. When he found that some were needy, he assisted them with money and books. ...
— In Troubadour-Land - A Ramble in Provence and Languedoc • S. Baring-Gould

... secret knavery and impositions practised upon seamen by connivance of the owners, landlords, and officers,— all these he had, and I could not but believe them; for he made the impression of an exact man, to whom exaggeration was falsehood; and his statements were always credited. I remember, among other things, his speaking of a captain whom I had known by report, who never handed a thing to a sailor, but put it on deck and kicked it to him; and ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana

... good and evil is strongly and sharply marked in the Gathas; the writers continually harp upon it, their minds are evidently struck with this sad antithesis which colors the whole moral world to them; they see everywhere a struggle between right and wrong, truth and falsehood, purity and impurity; apparently they are blind to the evidence of harmony and agreement in the universe, discerning nothing anywhere but strife, conflict, antagonism. Nor is this all. They go a step further, and ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 3. (of 7): Media • George Rawlinson

... particularly vigilant against racial discrimination in any of its ugly forms. Hitler will try again to breed mistrust and suspicion between one individual and another, one group and another, one race and another, one Government and another. He will try to use the same technique of falsehood and rumor-mongering with which he divided France from Britain. He is trying to do this with us even now. But he will find a unity of will and purpose against him, which will persevere until the destruction of all his black ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... matter with you? Tell me what is the matter with you. And if you tell me a falsehood, I'll soon find ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant

... a phrase never used to designate foreigners in this region except by those in the mandarin offices. Besides the absurdity of charging foreigners with distributing poison, the whole confession bears the evidence not only of falsehood, but, if ever made, of having been put into the man's mouth by those inside the mandarin offices and forced from him by torture, for the express purpose of exciting the intensest ...
— Forty Years in South China - The Life of Rev. John Van Nest Talmage, D.D. • Rev. John Gerardus Fagg

... casts from himself self-consciousness and self-command, brings on frenzy, and by repetition of this insanity, prostrates more and more his rational and moral powers. He sins immediately and directly against the rational nature, that Divine principle which, distinguishes between truth and falsehood, between right and wrong action, which, distinguishes man from the brute. This is the essence of the vice, what constitutes its peculiar guilt and woe, and what should particularly impress and awaken those who are laboring ...
— Grappling with the Monster • T. S. Arthur

... looked at each other, and appeared quite distressed at this suggestion. They had been, and rightly so, taught to consider deception of any kind as falsehood; but Mrs. Ellis did not appear to be of the same opinion, and though she still urged her own ill health and the absence of the nurse, she was evidently inclined to yield to the continued and ...
— Aunt Mary • Mrs. Perring

... one moment this new guest Has drove me out from this false woman's breast; They, that would fetter love with constancy, Make bonds to chain themselves, but leave him free With what impatience I her falsehood bear! Yet do myself that, which I blame in her; But interest in my own cause makes me see That act unjust in her, but just in ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. II • Edited by Walter Scott

... piece of ordnance at the distance of three miles. The Minnetarees frequently mentioned this noise like thunder, which they said the mountains made; but we had paid no attention to it, believing it to have been some superstition or perhaps a falsehood. The watermen also of the party say that the Pawnees and Ricaras give the same account of a noise heard in the Black mountains to the westward of them. The solution of the mystery given by the philosophy of the watermen is, that it is occasioned by the bursting ...
— History of the Expedition under the Command of Captains Lewis and Clark, Vol. I. • Meriwether Lewis and William Clark

... felt in her heart, implacable as it was to evil and falsehood, all capabilities of devotion and truth, was condemned to lie, or to lose the love of Prince Andras, which was her very life. There was no other alternative. No, no: since she had met this man, superior to all others, since ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... in falsehood, though to serve its purpose it is certainly adroitly written. We had not intended to be married on the evening of the mob, so that not only is the speech which the Editor puts in my mouth false, but so also is his statement ...
— The American Prejudice Against Color - An Authentic Narrative, Showing How Easily The Nation Got - Into An Uproar. • William G. Allen

... the house of Lord Tchang, Ming-Y told the first falsehood which had ever passed his lips. He averred that his mother had requested him thenceforward to pass his nights at home, now that the weather had become so pleasant; for, though the way was somewhat long, he was strong and active, and needed both air and healthy exercise. Tchang ...
— Some Chinese Ghosts • Lafcadio Hearn

... two blades of grass theory has been exploded, the increased production cry has been tried out, carried to its logical conclusion, and found wanting, and the inefficiency explanation has been proved a falsehood on its face. It is, therefore, obvious that with a proper system of distribution, the entire question of production will take care of itself; but just so long as the producers find it unprofitable to produce food, just so long will they have to figure carefully not to grow too much, ...
— Three Acres and Liberty • Bolton Hall

... abstraction is more than mental. If a huge eye sits in the middle of the cheek, in a child's drawing, this shows that the deep dynamic consciousness of the eye, its relative exaggeration, is the life-truth, even if it is a scientific falsehood. ...
— Fantasia of the Unconscious • D. H. Lawrence

... conquerors, was still, to the imagination, supreme above all other earthly titles; the story of Roman deeds was known of all men; the legends of Roman heroes were the familiar tales of infancy and age. Cities that had risen since Rome fell claimed, with pardonable falsehood, to have had their origin from her, and their rulers adopted the designations of her consuls and her senators. The fragments of her literature that had survived the destruction of her culture were the models for the rude writers of ignorant centuries, and her language formed the basis for ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various

... a wicked falsehood,' I said; 'you knew the weakness of my nature—that my sensitiveness was a disease—that to cross me was to kill. You have made both of ...
— Tales of the Chesapeake • George Alfred Townsend

... arms, to receive him; on the left, is a picture of St. Antony, of Padua, preaching to the fishes. Religion is truly part and parcel of this people's every day life; and the reality of their devotion, and the falsehood and frivolity of many of its objects, make a ...
— The Actress in High Life - An Episode in Winter Quarters • Sue Petigru Bowen

... older and wiser men and women might have taken lessons of these budding heroes and heroines; for here all was honest, sincere, and fresh; the old world had not taught them falsehood, self-interest, or mean ambitions. When they lost or won, they frankly grieved or rejoiced, and wore no masks except in play, and then got them off as soon as possible. If blue-eyed Lizzie frowned, or went home with Joe, Ned, with ...
— On Picket Duty and Other Tales • Louisa May Alcott

... there not a humble glen, Where we content and poor, Might build a cottage in the shade, A shepherd thou, and I to aid Thy task on dale and moor?— That reddening brow!—too well I know, Not even thy Clare can peace bestow, While falsehood stains thy name: Go then to fight! Clare bids thee go! Clare can a warrior's feelings know, And weep a warrior's shame; Buckle the spurs upon thy heel, And belt thee with thy brand of steel, And send thee ...
— The Prose Marmion - A Tale of the Scottish Border • Sara D. Jenkins

... contradiction, and having not the least evidence to rebut it, the Turk was obliged to withdraw from the royal presence discomfited, while the Armenian doctor retired to his own dwelling, comforting himself, in the first place, if he had uttered a falsehood it was in a good cause; and next, that he held it no crime to deceive or to cheat an infidel, and ever one knows how little love exists between the Turks ...
— The Circassian Slave; or, The Sultan's Favorite - A Story of Constantinople and the Caucasus • Lieutenant Maturin Murray

... civilization as a harlot with cheeks, lips, and eyelashes of artificial beauty. I imagined mountains of powder and paint, a deafening chorus of affected laughter, a huge heart, as large as a city, full of falsehood and mischief ...
— The Rise of David Levinsky • Abraham Cahan

... magi, Theodore of Mopsuestia[44] speaks of Ahriman as Satan ([Greek: Satanas]). At first sight there really is a surprising resemblance between the two. Both are heads of a numerous army of demons; both are spirits of error and falsehood, princes of darkness, {154} tempters and corrupters. An almost identical picture of the pair could be drawn, and in fact they are practically the same figure under different names. It is generally admitted that Judaism took the notion of ...
— The Oriental Religions in Roman Paganism • Franz Cumont

... cite Scripture for his purpose. An evil soul, producing holy witness, Is like a villain with a smiling cheek; A goodly apple rotten at the heart; O, what a goodly outside falsehood hath! ...
— Beautiful Stories from Shakespeare • E. Nesbit

... not know. I do not have to count and classify the women who think that way. When Rizal espoused the cause of the political rights of our race, his companions were very few, because in the majority of his compatriots that consciousness was lying dormant. But it would be a falsehood and an error to affirm that even at that time Rizal did not voice the cause of his entire race, and that no attention should be paid to his demands because he and those with him were few in number. He knew that his country was oppressed, that he was defending a just cause, and ...
— The Woman and the Right to Vote • Rafael Palma

... after all, the doing of the thing was in her own hands. She could refuse to marry this man without burdening her conscience with any lie about it. It only required that she should be firm. She abstained, therefore, from the falsehood, and left her lover's question unanswered. So she put up her letter and directed it, and carried it ...
— The Last Chronicle of Barset • Anthony Trollope

... of those slobbering American novels which serve up falsehood thickly buttered with righteousness and are consumed by ...
— The Dark Star • Robert W. Chambers

... charge). 'Do you think I am a Jack Cade or a Robin Hood?' he said. But though the evidence on this trial is not only in itself illegal, and by confession perjured, but the report of it comes to us with a falsehood on the face of it, and is therefore not to be taken without criticism; that there was a movement of some kind meditated about that time, by persons occupying chief places of trust and responsibility in the nation—a movement not favourable to the continuance of 'the standing departments' ...
— The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded • Delia Bacon

... impression produced not only by Farrar's article, but by all those solemn sermons, articles, and books which make their appearance from all sides directly there is anywhere a glimpse of truth exposing a predominant falsehood. At once begins the series of long, clever, ingenious, and solemn speeches and writings, which deal with questions nearly related to the subject, but skillfully avoid touching the ...
— The Kingdom of God is within you • Leo Tolstoy

... "That falsehood adds another stone to the many that will sink him in the lake of perdition, if there be one!" muttered Mr. Hamilton, as he departed for the counting-room. The last few sentences had fallen unheeded on Florence's ear, for she sat looking out ...
— Inez - A Tale of the Alamo • Augusta J. Evans

... you understand by fanaticism? A. The zeal of all particular sects which are spread over the earth, who commit crimes by making offerings to fraud and falsehood. ...
— The Mysteries of Free Masonry - Containing All the Degrees of the Order Conferred in a Master's Lodge • William Morgan

... all the winds of doctrine were let loose to play upon the earth, so truth be in the field, we do injuriously, by licensing and prohibiting, to misdoubt her strength. Let her and falsehood grapple; who ever knew truth put to the worse, in a free and open encounter? Her confuting is the best and ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams

... haven't much influence with this administration." As for that variety of humor that is called irony, it demands a duplicity which the straight-out-speaking Roosevelt could not practise. He was like Epaminondas in the Latin prose composition book, who was such a lover of truth that he never told a falsehood even in jest—ne ...
— Four Americans - Roosevelt, Hawthorne, Emerson, Whitman • Henry A. Beers

... ready to make an end of the villain then and there; for I smelt falsehood and devilry in every word he spoke. But I waited to let him say his say out first. There was little fear in the dark night, and the unsteady flare of the torches, of his ...
— Sir Ludar - A Story of the Days of the Great Queen Bess • Talbot Baines Reed

... objections, ignorant allegations. There is enough on the very surface, in her audacious assertions and high-handed changes, for popular arguments against her, without having recourse to exaggeration and falsehood; she may be a very faulty Church, without being Babylon and Antichrist. And in the higher forms of argument, there is abundance in those provinces of ancient theology and ecclesiastical history and ...
— The Oxford Movement - Twelve Years, 1833-1845 • R.W. Church

... by several of Pitt's supporters, especially by Rose. We have already noticed his contempt for Addington's financial shifts; and he now, on 8th January 1805, wrote to Bishop Tomline deploring Pitt's junction with "a man whose imbecility and falsehood, under Mr. Pitt's own sanction," had weakened the country. Pitt would now gain a few votes, no additional talents, and an increase of rancour in the Opposition. "We shall," adds Rose, "drag on a wretched existence and expire not creditably. What next will happen God only knows."[702] ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose

... trust it to its own evidence." Religion approaches men saying, "O taste and see that the Lord is good." He cannot be good unless He is. A fancied Deity, an invention however beautiful of men's brain, supposed to be a living Being, cannot be a blessing, but, like every other falsehood, a curse. If our religion is a stained glass window we color to hide the void beyond, then in the name of things as they are, whether they have a God or not, let us smash the deceiving glass, and face the darkness ...
— Some Christian Convictions - A Practical Restatement in Terms of Present-Day Thinking • Henry Sloane Coffin

... buffeted by winds, They found a narrow channel, where the fleet Halted for council. One returned to Spain Laden with falsehood and with mutiny. On sailed the others valiantly, their hearts Remembering their Admiral's haughty words Flung at his craven captain, "I will see This great voyage to the end, though we should eat The leather from the yards!" ...
— Days of the Discoverers • L. Lamprey

... avoid disliking an unfortunate people who were the cause of that shameful falsehood enacted during the famous review at which all Paris declared its will to succor Poland? The Poles were held up to them as the allies of the republican party, and they never once remembered that Poland was a republic of aristocrats. From that day forth the bourgeoisie treated with base contempt the ...
— Paz - (La Fausse Maitresse) • Honore de Balzac

... a part of Napoleon's cunning to mix truth with falsehood, and conceal his lies with an appearance of honor. The "twenty-ninth bulletin of the great army" contained facts which were partly true. He admitted the hardships, and palliated the faults; but he neither gave, nor wished to give, a true ...
— Worlds Best Histories - France Vol 7 • M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt

... xxv. 23, Tob. v. 12. &c.), and three times in the New Testament. Special mention need be made only of the bearers of the name in the New Testament. (1) A member of the first Christian community, who, with his wife Sapphira, was miraculously punished by Peter with sudden death for hypocrisy and falsehood (Acts v. 1-10; cf. Josh. vii. 1 ff.). (2) A disciple at Damascus who figures in the story of the conversion and baptism of Paul (Acts ix. 10-17, xxh. 12-16.) (3) Son of Nedebaios (Jos. Ant. xx. 5. 2), a high priest who presided during the trial of Paul at Jerusalem and Caesarea (Acts xxiii. 2, ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia

... individual freedom of industry imply a clearer recognition of the falsehood of the laissez faire position. The undertaking by the State or the Municipality, or other units of social life, of various departments of industry, such as the railways, telegraphs, post-offices, is a definite ...
— The Evolution of Modern Capitalism - A Study of Machine Production • John Atkinson Hobson

... of the denial of contradiction, and would like to be informed by the great master of the art, 'What is the meaning of this paradox? Is there no such thing as error, ignorance, falsehood? Then what are they professing to teach?' The two Sophists complain that Socrates is ready to answer what they said a year ago, but is 'non-plussed' at what they are saying now. 'What does the word ...
— Euthydemus • Plato

... Still." Ninety-foot column crowned by figure of Rising Sun, by Adolph A. Weinman, of New York. Reliefs at base of column, "Day Triumphant"; Time, Light, Truth, Energy, conquering Falsehood, Vice, and Darkness. Ornamental figures under upper bowl looking down into water, suggest Neptune, but are ...
— The City of Domes • John D. Barry

... lies there is hardly any reparation possible, and his forgiveness is much more difficult. Art, being the embodiment of the artist's ideal, is truly the corporeal substance of his spiritual self; and that there should be any falsehood in it, any deliberate failure to present him faithfully, it is as monstrous and unnatural as it would be for a man to disavow his own flesh and bones. Here we are every one of us going through life committed and attached to our bodies; for all that we do we ...
— The Speaker, No. 5: Volume II, Issue 1 - December, 1906. • Various

... brothers and sisters of these messengers of a matchless benevolence receive them? Ah, God! how sad that history should be compelled to make up so dark a record—abuse, contumely, violence! Christian tongues befouled with calumny! Christian lips blistered with falsehood! Christian hearts overflowing with hate! Christian, pens reeking with ridicule because other Christians sought to do their needy fellows good! No wonder that faith grew weak and unbelief ran riot through all the land when men looked upon the spectacle! The present may excuse, ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee

... I confess I am astonished at seeing you in Rome. Is there anything I can do for you? I shall always be grateful to you for having been alive to testify to the falsehood of that accusation made against my son. Pray sit down. How is your Signora? And the children? All well, ...
— Sant' Ilario • F. Marion Crawford

... that Lady Rowardennan of the Castle had promised the orphans, en bloc, that those who passed through an entire year without once falling into falsehood should have a treat or festival of their own choosing. On the eventful day of decision, those orphans, male and female, who had not for a twelve-month deviated from the truth by a hair's-breadth, raised ...
— Penelope's Irish Experiences • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... its full extent. What weight does the conviction of a woman carry with it, in a society like ours? But my whole sympathy is excited whenever I see sincerity struggling to the light. And that is why I believe that you are on the right path now, that you have entered upon this combat with falsehood. It is better to be utterly beaten in the battle than to lead ...
— Garman and Worse - A Norwegian Novel • Alexander Lange Kielland

... this time, was really ill with terror; for he believed that he had provoked the wrath of the Virgin Mary by breaking his oath. He was ready to do anything his companion told him to do, and weak enough to credit any falsehood. ...
— The True Story Book • Andrew Lang

... granting their emancipation, that the Vaudois were not the monsters he had been taught to believe. I have been told, that to this very day they carry their dead to the grave in open coffins, to give ocular demonstration of the falsehood of the calumnies propagated by their enemies, that the corpses of these heretics are sometimes consumed by invisible flames, or carried off by evil spirits before burial. But now all these disabilities ...
— Pilgrimage from the Alps to the Tiber - Or The Influence of Romanism on Trade, Justice, and Knowledge • James Aitken Wylie

... here and now. I cannot go away from this place a liar, as I came. Let me leave it here,—my cowardly, contemptible falsehood,—in this place of your cross. I am longing, like David, for that water they have gone to find, but I will not drink at Pilgrim Station, except with clean lips that have ...
— A Touch Of Sun And Other Stories • Mary Hallock Foote

... had been too well trained in the creed which allows and encourages the practice of speaking falsehood and even doing evil in a good cause, to feel that any kind of shame attached to a falsehood spoken to conceal from a crafty enemy a thing it would be perilous to others for him to know. And indeed diplomatic falsehood has never been eradicated from the world even since purer light has shone ...
— The Secret Chamber at Chad • Evelyn Everett-Green

... intelligence, every one of whom had known me as soldier, and I hope as gentleman, for years; and in each case the result was a duel, which has silenced those who imputed to me an unworthy and purposeless falsehood, but has left a heavy burden on my conscience, and has prevented me ever since from repeating what I know to be true and believe to be of greater interest, and in some sense of greater importance, than any scientific discovery of the last century. ...
— Across the Zodiac • Percy Greg

... then, as an imported poem, let us allow much barbarian merit. It came of dubious ancestry, and it had no progeny. The pretence that our glorious literature derives its lineage from "Beowulf" is in vulgar phrase 'a put up job'; a falsehood grafted upon our text-books by Teutonic and Teutonising professors who can bring less evidence for it than will cover a threepenny-piece. Its run for something like that money, in small educational manuals, has been in its way a ...
— On the Art of Writing - Lectures delivered in the University of Cambridge 1913-1914 • Arthur Quiller-Couch

... away from home, to make no effort for it. Moreover, a contest with the Yankee journalists is too unequal—they really write so well, and are so liberal in their ideas regarding the difference between fact and falsehood, have so little prejudice for, or against either, that they possess, and employ, a tremendous advantage. And then the pictorials—a special artist has only to catch a conception, in a Philadelphia ...
— History of Morgan's Cavalry • Basil W. Duke

... changing from a slow suburban train to a racing-car could not be listed as a sacrifice. He had not earned the money, Jimmie argued; he had only avoided paying it to the railroad. If he did not walk he would be obtaining the gratitude of Sadie by a falsehood. Therefore, he ...
— The Boy Scout and Other Stories for Boys • Richard Harding Davis

... sure to tell even his intimate friends that he was almost determined to take the "baronet's" offer of a mount. This he would do even where there was no possible turn in the betting to be affected by such falsehood. So that his companions were apt to complain that there was no knowing where to have Tifto. And then, they who were old enough in the world to have had some experience in men, had perceived that peculiar quality of his eyes, which never allowed him to look ...
— The Duke's Children • Anthony Trollope

... enraging. Mark Twain had his own ideas as to how far a joke might be carried without violence, and this was a good way beyond the limits. He denounced the Enquirer's statement as a "pitiful, deliberate falsehood," in his anger falling into the old-time phrasing of newspaper editorial abuse. He offered to bet them a thousand dollars in cash that they could not prove their assertions, and asked pointedly, in conclusion: ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine

... had not been so long in the Maltravers family as he had allowed Mr. Smart to suppose. So within so short a time it was possible that Sir John Maltravers of Worth should dread being detected, if not in an absolute falsehood, at least in having by ...
— The Lost Stradivarius • John Meade Falkner

... fortune-telling. Her cold haughty manners had often more success than the wheedling flatteries of the others. She looked as if she were quite above trickery of any kind, and no doubt the things she told were not altogether nonsense or falsehood. For she had learned to be wonderfully quick in reading the characters of those who applied to her, even in divining the thoughts and anxieties in their minds. And besides these resources the gipsies had ...
— "Us" - An Old Fashioned Story • Mary Louisa S. Molesworth



Words linked to "Falsehood" :   statement, frame-up, prevarication, dodge, dodging, misrepresentation, fabrication, forgery, scheme, deceit, contradiction, sophistication, knavery, deception, falsification, fiction, setup, dishonesty, truth, lie, contradiction in terms, fable



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