Quotes About Deception

“There is nothing more deceptive than an obvious fact.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, The Boscombe Valley Mystery

“Appear weak when you are strong, and strong when you are weak.”
― Sun Tzu, The Art of War

“Seldom, very seldom, does complete truth belong to any human disclosure; seldom can it happen that something is not a little disguised or a little mistaken.”
― Jane Austen, Emma

“Oh, what a tangled web we weave...when first we practice to deceive.”
― Walter Scott, Marmion

“Just because something isn't a lie does not mean that it isn't deceptive. A liar knows that he is a liar, but one who speaks mere portions of truth in order to deceive is a craftsman of destruction.”
― Criss Jami

“A lie that is half-truth is the darkest of all lies.”
― Alfred Tennyson

“Man is not what he thinks he is, he is what he hides.”
― André Malraux

“Never try to do anything that is outside of who you are. A forced smile is a sign of what feels wrong in your heart, so recognize it when it happens. Living a lie will reduce you to one.”
― Ashly Lorenzana

“Deceiving others. That is what the world calls a romance.”
― Oscar Wilde

“Some things just couldn't be protectd from storms. Some things simply needed to be broken off...Once old thing were broken off, amazingly beautiful thing could grow in their place.”
― Denise Hildreth Jones

“Writing fiction is the act of weaving a series of lies to arrive at a greater truth.”
― Khaled Hosseini

“A man when he is making up to anybody can be cordial and gallant and full of little attentions and altogether charming. But when a man is really in love he can't help looking like a sheep.”
― Agatha Christie, The Mystery of the Blue Train

“Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!”
― L. Frank Baum, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz

“And we all know love is a glass which makes even a monster appear fascinating.”
― Alberto Moravia, The Woman of Rome

“People are secretive when they have secrets.”
― Deb Caletti, The Secret Life of Prince Charming

“Many things are not as they seem: The worst things in life never are.”
― Jim Butcher, White Night

“People trust their eyes above all else - but most people see what they wish to see, or what they believe they should see; not what is really there”
― Zoë Marriott, Shadows on the Moon

“His lies were so exquisite I almost wept.”
― Dave Eggers, What Is the What

“And thus I clothe my naked villainy
With odd old ends stol'n out of holy writ;
And seem a saint, when most I play the devil.”
― William Shakespeare, Richard III

“Do actions agree with words? There's your measure of reliability. Never confine yourself to the words.”
― Frank Herbert, Chapterhouse: Dune

“In every age it has been the tyrant, the oppressor and the exploiter who has wrapped himself in the cloak of patriotism, or religion, or both to deceive and overawe the People."

(Canton, OH, Anti-War Speech, June 16, 1918)”
― Eugene Victor Debs, Voices of a People's History of the United States

“I used to loathe ambivalence; now I adore it. Ambivalence is my new best friend.”
― Suzanne Finnamore, Split: A Memoir of Divorce

“I remember one desolate Sunday night, wondering: Is this how I´m going to spend the rest of my life? Marrid to someone who is perpetually distracted and somewhat wistful, as though a marvelous party is going on in the next room, which but for me he could be attending?”
― Suzanne Finnamore

“At first I did not love you, Jude; that I own. When I first knew you I merely wanted you to love me. I did not exactly flirt with you; but that inborn craving which undermines some women's morals almost more than unbridled passion--the craving to attract and captivate, regardless of the injury it may do the man--was in me; and when I found I had caught you, I was frightened. And then--I don't know how it was-- I couldn't bear to let you go--possibly to Arabella again--and so I got to love you, Jude. But you see, however fondly it ended, it began in the selfish and cruel wish to make your heart ache for me without letting mine ache for you.”
― Thomas Hardy, Jude the Obscure

“And when I speak, I don't speak as a Democrat. Or a Republican. Nor an American. I speak as a victim of America's so-called democracy. You and I have never seen democracy - all we've seen is hypocrisy. When we open our eyes today and look around America, we see America not through the eyes of someone who has enjoyed the fruits of Americanism. We see America through the eyes of someone who has been the victim of Americanism. We don't see any American dream. We've experienced only the American nightmare.”
― Malcolm X

“Oh! that look of love!" continued he, between his teeth, as he bolted himself into his own private room. "And that cursed lie; which showed some terrible shame in the background, to be kept from the light in which I thought she lived perpetually! Oh, Margaret, Margaret! Mother, how you have tortured me! Oh! Margaret, could you not have loved me? I am but uncouth and hard, but I would never have led you into any falsehood for me.”
― Elizabeth Gaskell, North and South

“We’re a different sort of thief here, Lamora. Deception and misdirection are our tools. We don’t believe in hard work when a false face and a good line of bullshit can do so much more.”
― Scott Lynch, The Lies of Locke Lamora

“Her words were like tinfoil; they shone and they covered things up.”
― Helen Cross, My Summer of Love

“Betrayal and dishonor is usually an inside job. Keep it 'sucka-free', loved one!”
― T.F. Hodge, From Within I Rise: Spiritual Triumph Over Death and Conscious Encounters with "The Divine Presence"

“Later, when she sees the photographs for the first time, she will be surprised at how calm her face looks - how steady her gaze, how erect her posture. In the picture her eyes will be slightly closed, and there will be a shadow on her neck. The shawl will be draped around her shoulders, and her hands will rest in her lap. In this deceptive photograph, she will look a young woman who is not at all disturbed or embarrassed, but instead appears to be rather serious. And she wonders if, in its ability to deceive, photography is not unlike the sea, which may offer a benign surface to the observe even as it conceals depths and current below.”
― Anita Shreve, Fortune's Rocks