Deceit DECE'IT,
1. Literally, a catching or ensnaring. Hence, the misleading of a person; the leading of another person to believe what is false, or not to believe what is true, and thus to ensnare him; fraud; fallacy; cheat; any declaration, artifice or practice, which misleads another, or causes him to believe what is false.
My lips shall not speak wickedness, nor my tongue utter deceit. Job 27.
2. Stratagem; artifice; device intended to mislead.
They imagine deceits all the day long. Psa 38.
3. In scripture, that which is obtained by guile, fraud or oppression.
Their houses are full of deceit. Jer 5. Zeph. I.
4. In law, any trick, device, craft, collusion, shift, covin, or underhand practice, used to defraud another.

deceit n 1: the quality of being fraudulent [syn: fraudulence, deceit] 2: a misleading falsehood [syn: misrepresentation, deceit, deception] 3: the act of deceiving [syn: deception, deceit, dissembling, dissimulation]

deceit noun Etymology: Middle English deceite, from Anglo-French, from Latin decepta, feminine of deceptus, past participle of decipere Date: 14th century 1. the act or practice of deceiving ; deception 2. an attempt or device to deceive ; trick 3. the quality of being deceitful ; deceitfulness

deceit
n.
1 the act or process of deceiving or misleading, esp. by concealing the truth.
2 a dishonest trick or stratagem.
3 willingness to deceive.
Etymology: ME f. OF f. past part. of deceveir f. L decipere deceive (as DE-, capere take)

deceit (deceits) Deceit is behaviour that is deliberately intended to make people believe something which is not true. They have been involved in a campaign of deceit. = deception N-VAR

deceit dɪˈsi:t n. 1 the act or process of deceiving or misleading, esp. by concealing the truth. 2 a dishonest trick or stratagem. 3 willingness to deceive. [ME f. OF f. past part. of deceveir f. L decipere deceive (as DE-, capere take)]

DECEIT 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! Merchant of Venice, Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE. A man I knew who lived upon a smile, And well it fed him; he looked plump and fair. While rankest venom foamed through every vein. Night Thoughts, Night VIII. DR. E. YOUNG. The world is still deceived with ornament, In law, what plea so tainted and corrupt, But, being seasoned with a gracious voice, Obscures the show of evil? In religion, What damnèd error, but some sober brow Will bless it and approve it with a text, Hiding the grossness with fair ornament? Merchant of Venice, Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. Think'st thou there are no serpents in the world But those who slide along the grassy sod. And sting the luckless foot that presses them? There are who in the path of social life Do bask their spotted skins in Fortune's sun, And sting the soul. De Montford, Act i. Sc. 2. J. BAILLIE. Hateful to me as are the gates of hell, Is he who, hiding one thing in his heart, Utters another. The Iliad, Bk. IX. HOMER. Translation of BRYANT. Oh, that deceit should steal such gentle shapes, And with a virtuous vizard hide foul guile! K. Richard III., Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE. Our better part remains To work in close design, by fraud or guile, What force effected not; that he no less At length from us may find, who overcomes By force hath overcome but half his foe. Paradise Lost, Bk. I. MILTON. Appearances to save, his only care; So things seem right, no matter what they are. Rosciad. C. CHURCHILL. Stamps God's own name upon a lie just made, To turn a penny in the way of trade. Table Talk. W. COWPER.

Deceit Ah, that deceit should steal such gentle shapes, And with a virtuous visor hide deep vice. SHAKESPEARE: Richard III., Act ii., Sc. 2. O, what a tangled web we weave, When first we practise to deceive. SCOTT: Marmion, Canto vi., St.

Deceit \De*ceit"\, n. [OF. deceit, des[,c]ait, decept (cf. deceite, de[,c]oite), fr. L. deceptus deception, fr. decipere. See Deceive.] 1. An attempt or disposition to deceive or lead into error; any declaration, artifice, or practice, which misleads another, or causes him to believe what is false; a contrivance to entrap; deception; a wily device; fraud. Making the ephah small and the shekel great, and falsifying the balances by deceit. --Amos viii. 5. Friendly to man, far from deceit or guile. --Milton. Yet still we hug the dear deceit. --N. Cotton. 2. (Law) Any trick, collusion, contrivance, false representation, or underhand practice, used to defraud another. When injury is thereby effected, an action of deceit, as it called, lies for compensation. Syn: Deception; fraud; imposition; duplicity; trickery; guile; falsifying; double-dealing; stratagem. See Deception.

DECEIT de-set' (mirmah; (dolos)): The intentional misleading or beguiling of another; in Scripture represented as a companion of many other forms of wickedness, as cursing (Ps 10:7), hatred (Pr 26:24), theft, covetousness, adultery, murder (Mr 7:22; Ro 1:29). The Revised Version (British and American) introduces the word in Pr 14:25; 2Th 2:10; but in such passages as Ps 55:11; Pr 20:17; 26:26; 1Th 2:3, renders a variety of words, more accurately than the King James Version, by "oppression," "falsehood," "guile," "error."

deceit n. Deception, fraud, imposition, imposture, finesse, artifice, duplicity, guile, trickery, chicanery, cozenage, cheating, double-dealing, crooked ways, dark ways, underhandedness, deceitfulness.

deceit dɪˈsi:t n. 1 deception, deceitfulness, fraud, fraudulence, cheating, trickery, chicanery or chicane, dissimulation, dishonesty, misrepresentation, double-dealing, duplicity, hypocrisy, treachery, underhandedness, guile, craft, slyness, craftiness, cunning, knavery, funny business, Colloq hanky-panky, monkey business: Inside traders on the Stock Exchange profit enormously from deceit. 2 trick, subterfuge, stratagem, ploy, ruse, manoeuvre, artifice, wile, hoax, swindle, double-cross, misrepresentation, pretence, sham, contrivance, shift, confidence trick, subreption, gloze, Brit dialect or colloq US flam; Colloq flimflam; Slang scam, con, con trick, con game: She was sick of all his lies and deceits.

90 Moby Thesaurus words for "deceit": art, artful dodge, artfulness, artifice, blind, cheating, chicane, chicanery, con, con game, conspiracy, contrivance, coup, craft, craftiness, cunning, cute trick, deceitfulness, deception, defrauding, design, device, dishonesty, dissemblance, dissimulation, dodge, double-cross, double-dealing, duplicity, expedient, fakement, falseheartedness, falseness, feint, fetch, flam, flimflam, fraud, fraudulence, furtiveness, gambit, game, gimmick, grift, guile, gyp, hanky-panky, hoax, humbug, hypocrisy, indirection, insidiousness, intrigue, jugglery, knavery, little game, maneuver, misrepresentation, monkey business, move, overreaching, plot, ploy, racket, red herring, ruse, scam, scheme, sell, sham, shift, shiftiness, sleight, slyness, sneak attack, sneakiness, stratagem, strategy, subterfuge, surreptitiousness, swindle, tactic, trapping, treacherousness, treachery, trick, trickery, underhandedness, wile, wily device

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