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Deception Quotes

Browse 1380 quotes about Deception.

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Deception Quotes

“...Why are all these masks winking?" Jason pointed around the room with his fork. The loremaster dabbed at his mouth with a frilled purple napkin. "One eye is open to all truth, the other closed to all deception.”

EyeRoomsMouthsDeceptionMaskPurpleForksJasonNapkinsWinking
Book:Brandon Mull's Beyonders Trilogy: A World Without Heroes; Seeds of Rebellion; Chasing the Prophecy
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“What I warn you to remember is that I am a detective. Our relationship with truth is fundamental but cracked, refracting confusingly like fragmented glass. It is the core of our careers, the endgame of every move we make, and we pursue it with strategies painstakingly constructed of lies and concealment and every variation on deception.”

RememberMovingLyingCareersTruth IsFundamentalsStrategyGlassesCorePursueDeceptionOur RelationshipVariationDetectivesCrackedFragmentedEndgameConcealment
Author:Tana French
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“Most of our platitudes notwithstanding, self-deception remains the most difficult deception. The tricks that work on others count for nothing in that very well-lit back alley where one keeps assignation with oneself: no winning smiles will do here, no prettily drawn lists of good intentions. One shuffles flashily but in vain through one's marked cards- the kindness done for the wrong reason, the apparent triumph which involved no real effort, the seemingly heroic act into which one had been shamed.”

WellsRealSelfReasonDoneWinningDifficultEffortKindnessInvolvedRemainsIntentionOneselfListsTricksCardsDeceptionTriumphVainHeroicLitSelf DeceptionGood IntentionsAlleysWrong ReasonsPlatitudesShuffleHeroic ActsBack Alleys
Book:Slouching towards Bethlehem
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“The setting sun burned the sky pink and orange in the same bright hues as surfers' bathing suits. It was beautiful deception, Bosch thought, as he drove north on the Hollywood Freeway to home. Sunsets did that here. Made you forget it was the smog that made their colors so brilliant, that behind every pretty picture there could be an ugly story.”

MadeStoriesHomeBeautifulForgetBehindsSunSkyColorHollywoodUglyBrilliantSettingSettingsSuitsDeceptionSunsetBurnedOrangeForget ItHueBathingSurferFreewaysBathing SuitsSmogPretty Picture
Book:The Black Echo
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“How shall Integrity face Oppression? What shall Honesty do in the face of Deception, Decency in the face of Insult, Self-Defense before Blows? How shall Desert and Accomplishment meet Despising, Detraction, and Lies? What shall Virtue do to meet Brute Force? There are so many answers and so contradictory; and such differences for those on the one hand who meet questions similar to this once a year or once a decade, and those who face them hourly and daily.”

YearsSelfHandsFacesLyingForceDifferencesAnswersVirtueHonestyIntegrityBlowDefenseDecadesOppressionDesertDeceptionAccomplishmentInsultDecencyContradictoryBrutesSelf DefenseBrute Force
Author:W. E. B. Du Bois
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“We are all members of the same flawed species. Putting our moral vision into practice means imposing our will on others. The human lust for power and esteem, coupled with its vulnerability to self-deception and self-righteousness, makes that an invitation to a calamity, all the worse when the power is directed at a goal as quixotic as eradicating human self-interest.”

HumansMeanSelfGoalInterestMoralVisionPracticeMembersSpeciesLustEsteemDeceptionVulnerabilityRighteousnessFlawedInvitationsCalamitySelf InterestSelf DeceptionImposingSelf RighteousnessLust For PowerQuixotic
Author:Steven Pinker
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“The bourgeoisie, which far surpasses the proletariat in the completeness and irreconcilibility of its class consciousness, is vitally interested in imposing its moral philosophy upon the exploited masses. It is exactly for this purpose that the concrete norms of the bourgeois catechism are concealed under moral abstractions...The appeal to abstract norms is not a disinterested philosophic mistake but a necessary element in the mechanics of class deception.”

PhilosophyPurposeMistakeConsciousnessMoralClassElementsMassAppealsDeceptionAbstractConcreteNormAbstractionMechanicConcealedBourgeoisImposingProletariatBourgeoisieCompletenessDisinterestedPhilosophicMoral PhilosophyCatechismClass Consciousness
Author:Leon Trotsky
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“Come little children I'll take thee away, into a land of Enchantment Come little children the time's come to play here in my garden of Shadows Follow sweet children I'll show thee the way through all the pain and the Sorrows Weep not poor childlen for life is this way murdering beauty and Passions Hush now dear children it must be this way to weary of life and Deceptions Rest now my children for soon we'll away into the calm and the Quiet Come little children I'll take thee away, into a land of Enchantment Come little children the time's come to play here in my garden of Shadows”

WayChildrenLittlesPlayShowsPainLife IsPassionPoorLandSweetSorrowQuietShadowGardenCalmDearTheeDeceptionMy ChildrenWearyEnchantmentHushSweet Child
Author:Edgar Allan Poe
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“We feel lonely now and then and long for friends and think we should be quite different and happier if we found a friend of whom we might say: “He is the one.” But you, too, will begin to learn that there is much self-deception behind this longing; if we yielded too much to it, it would lead us from the road.”

IfsThinkingFeelsShouldLongDifferentSelfMightFoundBehindsToo MuchLonelyLongingDeceptionNow And ThenSelf DeceptionFeeling Lonely
Book:Delphi Complete Works of Vincent van Gogh (Illustrated)
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“Mundus vult decipi'—the world wants to be deceived. To live without deception presupposes standards beyond the reach of most people whose existence is largely shaped by compromise, evasion and mutual accommodation. Could they face their weakness, their vanity and selfishness, without a mask?”

PeopleWorldWantFacesExistenceStandardsWeaknessCompromiseVanityDeceptionSelfishnessMaskMutualDeceivedEvasionAccommodations
Book:A Passion for Truth
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“If you do have to look at polls, you should do it no more than once every few days, to get a general sense of the state of the race. I've seen the work on information overload, which makes people depressed, stressed and freezes their brains. I know that checking the polls constantly is a recipe for self-deception and anxiety.”

PeopleIfsKnowsShouldLooksSelfStatesPoliticsRaceBrainInformationAnxietyDeceptionRecipesPollsStressedSelf DeceptionFreezeOverloadInformation Overload
Author:David Brooks
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“The process [of mass-media deception] has to be conscious, or it would not be carried out with sufficient precision, but it also has to be unconscious, or it would bring with it a feeling of falsity and hence of guilt.... To tell deliberate lies while genuinely believing in them, to forget any fact that has become inconvenient, and then, when it becomes necessary again, to draw it back from oblivion for just so long as it is needed, to deny the existence of objective reality and all the while to take account of the reality which one denies all this is indispensably necessary.”

BelieveLongFactsFeelingsRealityTruthLyingProcessForgetExistenceMediaNeededMassDrawsConsciousAccountsGuiltDenyTyrannyObjectivesDeceptionSufficientUnconsciousTyrantsOblivionDeliberatePrecisionInconvenientMass MediaFalsityObjective RealityMedia ControlIgnorance In 1984
Author:George Orwell
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“The statesmen will invent cheap lies, putting the blame upon the nation that is attacked, and every man will be glad of those conscience-soothing falsities, and will diligently study them, and refuse to examine any refutations of them; and thus he will by and by convince himself that the war is just, and will thank God for the better sleep he enjoys after this process of grotesque self-deception.”

MenWarSelfTruthPoliticalLyingNationsPeaceProcessEnjoySleepStudyConscienceBlameRefuseEvery ManGladTyrannyDeceptionConvinceTyrantsThank GodAntiwarSelf DeceptionStatesmenSoothingGrotesqueFalsityRefutationWar Propaganda
Book:The Complete Works of Mark Twain (Illustrated Edition): Novels, Short Stories, Memoir, Travel Books, Letters, Biography, Articles & Speeches: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer & Huckleberry Finn, Life on the Mississippi, Yankee in King Arthur's Court…
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“The highest compact we can make with our fellow is - "Let there be truth between us two forevermore."”

TwoTruthHonestyTrustTruth IsHighestEthicsCommitmentFellowsBetrayalLoyaltyBeing HonestDeceptionCompactHonest TruthTruth And HonestyTruth HonestyTrust HonestyTrust And Honesty
Book:The Prose Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson: Representative men. English traits. Conduct of life
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“At the very outset I have to tell you that truth is what it is. You cannot mold it, you cannot change it. It is always the same. It has been the same, it is the same, it will be the same. But to say that we know the truth and that we have the truth is really a self-deception. If you had known the absolute truth there would have been no problems and everybody would have said the same thing. There would be no discussions, no arguments, no fights and wars. But when we don't know the absolute truth then we can find out our own mental conceptions as the truth. But this mind is so limited.”

IfsKnowsLoveMindHas BeensSaidWarSelfProblemWisdomWould BeSpiritFightingKnownMeditationTruth IsYogaArgumentAbsolutesDeceptionDiscussionWellnessConceptionNo ProblemMoldSelf DeceptionAbsolute Truth
Author:Nirmala Srivastava
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“Men were considered "free" only so that they might be considered guilty - could be judged and punished: consequently, every act had to be considered as willed, and the origin of every act had to be considered as lying within the consciousness (and thus the most fundamental psychological deception was made the principle of psychology itself).”

MenMadeMightLyingConsciousnessPrinciplesPsychologyIndependentFundamentalsPsychologicalGuiltyDeceptionJudged
Book:Twilight of the Idols
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