COCKSURE • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Cocksure

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adjective

Cocksure adj.

Perfectly safe. (Obs.) "We steal as in a castle, cocksure:... we walk invisible."

Quite certain. (Colloq.) "I thought myself cocksure of the horse which he readily promised me."

Overconfident; of people; as, the team was so cocksure of winning that they didn't practice in the week before the big game.. (Colloq.)

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Etymology of 'Cocksure'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Cocksure" Quotes from Famous Books

... tellt you,' retorted Robert, with an equivocation altogether unworthy of his growing honesty. 'I was cocksure that cudna be a fiddle. There's the fiddle i' the hert o' 't! Losh! I min' noo. It maun be my grandfather's fiddle 'at I hae heard ...

— Robert Falconer • George MacDonald

... face, and shook his head. In a way, he thought, it was a pity to see such a change in the rosy-cheeked, dapper, cocksure little man who had talked his way glibly in and out of more jams than Meyerhoff could count. Trading brought scalpers; it was almost inevitable that where rich and unexploited trading ground was uncovered, it would first fall prey to the fast-trading boys. They ...

— Letter of the Law • Alan Edward Nourse

... fastidiousness of Matthew Arnold, and yet imitate neither. They have a quality, indeed, which is entirely their own and is entirely delightful. One of the things which is so charming about them is that they are authoritative without being cocksure. What could be more admirable than the passage which points out that Southey, "who lived almost entirely with domestic women, actually died in the belief that he was a poet"? The pathos of the situation, and the ...

— The Adventure of Living • John St. Loe Strachey

... disguises of the Reverend Richard Peploe Brabazon, the Honourable David Granton, Count von Lebenstein, Professor Schleiermacher, Dr. Quackenboss, and others. He had not the slightest doubt of the man's identity. He could swear to him anywhere. I thought, for my own part, he was a trifle too cocksure. A certain amount of hesitation would have been better policy. As to the various swindles, he detailed them in full, his evidence to be supplemented by that of bank officials and other subordinates. In short, he left Finglemore not a leg to ...

— An African Millionaire - Episodes in the Life of the Illustrious Colonel Clay • Grant Allen

... legs comfortably and looked at me with a queer little tilt of his left eyebrow, but with an unsmiling visage. He was too cocksure of himself to grant me even so much as an ingratiating smile. Was not I a glory-seeking American and he one of the glorious? It would be doing me a favour to let me ...

— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon

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