Quotes About Deception

In all professions each affects a look and an exterior to appear what he wishes the world to believe that he is. Thus we may say that the whole world is made up of appearances.

It's bad enough being conned into singing an anti-war message by John Lennon when you think you're just wishing everyone a merry Christmas.

Commend a fool for his wit, or a rogue for his honesty and he will receive you into his favor.

Wit is the most rascally, contemptible, beggarly thing on the face of the earth.

For those whose wit becomes the mother of villainy, those it educates to be evil in all things.

Witchcraft is one of the most baseless, absurd, disgusting and silly of all the humbugs.

Polygraph tests are 20th-century witchcraft.

When running a Ponzi scheme, how does one avoid enormous, unexpected withdrawals - runs on the bank, so to speak - that would pull back the curtain and reveal a little man blowing smoke? One way would be to attract a core of investors who could be counted on to never withdraw more than a small percentage of principal each year.

Spying is a like a game of chess: Sometimes you have to withdraw, sometimes you have to sacrifice one of your pieces to win - preferably a knight rather than a king or queen.

A dimple on the chin, the devil within.

Illusion is needed to disguise the emptiness within.

Few of them were to be trusted within reach of a trowel and a pile of bricks.

Sense perceptions can be and often are false and deceptive, however real they may appear to us. Where there is realization outside the senses, it is infallible. It is proved not by extraneous evidence but in the transformed conduct and character of those who have felt the real presence of God within.

Within 18 months of my parents' marriage in 1900, my mother fell in love with an Englishman who would have described himself as a gentleman but who was, in fact, nothing more than a devious adventurer.

All children have to be deceived if they are to grow up without trauma.

Beauty without grace is the hook without the bait.

Though lust do masque in ne'er so strange disguise she's oft found witty, but is never wise.

Nowadays three witty turns of phrase and a lie make a writer.

Then, as if that's not enough, then they declare that my wife is Jewish or Serbian. Luckily for me, she never was either, although many wives are. And so on and so forth spreading lies.

Showbiz and churches are the same thing. You never saw 'The Wizard of Oz?'

No matter how subtle the wizard, a knife between the shoulder blades will cramp his style.

Someone asked me who I would be if I were a character in the 'Wizard of Oz.' I would be the curtain. I would be the one who saw both sides that nobody noticed, that was pretty and there to be used and discarded when they were done.

How I conned the Grand Wizard, David Duke, and his coterie of followers... It has defined me in ways I never could have imagined.

I woke up one morning to an email from my friend Alex that said she'd had her bag stolen. Ordinarily, I'm quite quick on the uptake, but - maybe because of the way it was worded - I immediately replied, 'What??????' As soon as I hit send, I realised I was being scammed. But then they replied, and I thought, 'Well, why not?'