“How many wicked intentions climb aboard a pure and innocent phrase, after it is already on its way! It is enough to make one suspect that lying is, many a time, as involuntary as breathing.”

— Machado de Assis, book Dom Casmurro

Quantas intenções viciosas há assim que embarcam, a meio caminho, numa frase inocente e pura! Chega a fazer suspeitar que a mentira é muita vez tão involuntária como a transpiração.
Source: Dom Casmurro (1899), Ch. 41, p. 100.

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Machado de Assis16

Brazilian writer 1839–1908

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