“Never do I deceive you, Hastings. I only permit you to deceive yourself.”
Hercule Poirot’s Early Cases (1974)
Source: The Mysterious Affair at Styles
“It is not difficult to deceive the first time, for the deceived possesses no antibodies; unvaccinated by suspicion, she overlooks latenesses, accepts absurd excuses, permits the flimsiest patchings to repair great rents in the quotidian.”
—
John Updike
,
book
Couples
Source: Couples (1968), Ch. 2
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John Updike 240
American novelist, poet, short story writer, art critic, an… 1932–2009Related quotes
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“O, what a tangled web we weave,
When first we practise to deceive!”
Canto VI, st. 17.
Variant: Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive
Source: Marmion (1808)
Nous nous trompons toujours deux fois sur ceux que nous aimons: d'abord à leur avantage, puis à leur désavantage.
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Variant: He discovered the cruel paradox by which we always deceive ourselves twice about the people we love — first to their advantage, then to their disadvantage.
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Source: 1840s, Works of Love (1847), p. 5