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Misrepresent   Listen
verb
Misrepresent  v. i.  To make an incorrect or untrue representation.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Misrepresent" Quotes from Famous Books



... man of learning, sent from the court of Prussia solely to make astronomical and natural observations there; and having no interest in the slavery of the Negroes, had not the same inducement as most other relators had, to misrepresent the natives of Africa. He resided eight years at and about the Cape of Good Hope, during which time he examined with great care into the customs, manners, and opinions of the Hottentots; whence he sets these people in a quite different light from ...
— Some Historical Account of Guinea, Its Situation, Produce, and the General Disposition of Its Inhabitants • Anthony Benezet

... is dead, those papers and politicians that were wont to abuse and misrepresent him most brutally are fairly falling over each other to do him honor. The post-mortem gush is sickening because of its insincerity. If Henry George was not a great man living he is not a great man dead. If his economic views were ...
— Volume 10 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann

... railroad press has always been ready to misrepresent and malign executive officers who have refused to acknowledge any higher authority than the law, the expressed public will and their own conception of duty. This abuse has even been carried so far that the editorial columns of leading dailies have been prostituted by the insertion ...
— The Railroad Question - A historical and practical treatise on railroads, and - remedies for their abuses • William Larrabee

... undoubtedly was on his side —but as he could not deprive his nephews, on that foundation, without bastardizing their sisters too, no wonder, the historians, who wrote under the Lancastrian domination, have used all their art and industry to misrepresent the fact. If the marriage of Edward the Fourth with the widow Grey was bigamy, and consequently null, what became of the title of Elizabeth of York, wife of Henry the Seventh? What became of it? Why a bastard branch of Lancaster, matched with a bastard ...
— Historic Doubts on the Life and Reign of King Richard the Third • Horace Walpole

... withal, what was most profitable, most pernicious, most strong, and most easy. Did he resolve and answer every one of these questions? He did, quoth Niloxenus, and do you judge of his answers and the soundness thereof: and it is my Prince's purpose not to misrepresent his responses and condemn unjustly what he saith well, so, where he finds him under a mistake, not to suffer that to pass without correction. His answers to the foresaid questions I will read to you.—What is most ...
— Essays and Miscellanies - The Complete Works Volume 3 • Plutarch

... this is the picture chosen by the Lord Jesus when he desires to show how God regards suppliant disciples as they plead at his footstool. It is an amazing revelation, and the best of it is its truth. He who gave it has authority to speak. The Son will not misrepresent the Father; the Father's honour is safe in this Teacher's hands. We learn here, then, that the Hearer of prayer puts himself in the power of a suppliant. He permitted Jacob to wrestle, and the firmer he felt the grasp the more he ...
— The Parables of Our Lord • William Arnot

... and Southern, Atlantic and Western—whence designing men may endeavor to excite a belief that there is real difference of local interests and views. One of the expedients of party to acquire influence within particular districts is to misrepresent the opinions and aims of other districts. You can not shield yourselves too much against the jealousies and heart-burnings which spring from these misrepresentations; they tend to render alien to each other those who ought to be bound together by fraternal affection. ...
— Key-Notes of American Liberty • Various

... position and the influence attached to it subservient either to their interests or to their vanity? Descend, gentlemen reviewers, from the heights on which you have perched yourselves; lay aside your airs and your tricks, your pretences and affectations! Have the honesty not to misrepresent your author, the decency not to abuse him, the patience to read, and if possible to understand him! Point out his blemishes, correct his blunders, castigate his faults; it is your duty,—he himself will have reason to thank you. But do not approach him with ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 102, April, 1866 • Various

... the city the greatest mischief, was managing and directing your communications with Philip in Philip's own interest: and I came forward and informed you; and that, not to gratify any private dislike or desire to misrepresent him, as subsequent events have made plain. {7} And in this case I shall not, as before, throw the blame on any speakers or defenders of Neoptolemus—indeed, he had no defenders; it is yourselves that ...
— The Public Orations of Demosthenes, volume 1 • Demosthenes

... Castile: And the Priests perswasions wrought so effectually on them, that they condescended to that which was never done in India before (for whatsoever those Tyrants who wasted and consumed these large Kingdoms and Provinces, did misrepresent and falsifie, was only done to bring an odium and disgrace upon the Indians). For Twelve or Fifteen Princes of spatious and well-peopled Regions assembled, every one distinct and separate from the rest, with his own subjects, and by their unanimous consent upon Council and Advice, ...
— A Brief Account of the Destruction of the Indies • Bartolome de las Casas

... owing to this party that the idea has never been altogether abandoned that Mexico should resume monarchical institutions; and every attempt that has been made to favor what in this country is known as consolidation has either been initiated by it or has received its assistance. That we do not misrepresent the so-called clerical party, in attributing to it a desire to see a king in Mexico, is clear from the candid admission of one of its members, who has written at length, and with much ability, in defence of its opinions and actions. "Had it been given to that ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 5, No. 28, February, 1860 • Various

... abstraction. Apart from the actual fact neither matter nor memory have independent existence. This is where Berg-son disagrees with the philosophers who regard the facts as signs of an independent material world, or as phenomena which misrepresent some "thing" in "itself" which is what really exists but which is not known directly but only inferred from the phenomena. For Bergson it is the fact directly known that really exists, and matter and memory, solid tables, ...
— The Misuse of Mind • Karin Stephen

... that book than what has so often been most unfairly attributed to it, namely, an attempt to show that a charge of plagiarism might be justly urged against Tennyson. No honest critic, who had even cursorily inspected the book, could so utterly misrepresent its purpose.] ...
— The Early Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson • Tennyson

... were pretty nearly as broad distinctions, and as much a war- cry, as English and French, Roman and Punic. Now, however, all this is altered. As regards the relations between the two Whigs whom Schlosser so steadfastly delighteth to misrepresent, ...
— The Notebook of an English Opium-Eater • Thomas de Quincey

... career that was ever based on any other motive than absolute egotism and selfishness; to one single utterance, act, word, or deed of yourself that was not based on selfishness and a desire to rob or misrepresent or, in some other manner, attach the earnings of the people to your coffers without ...
— Frenzied Finance - Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated • Thomas W. Lawson

... before they got through the saloon-keeper would have taken in a dollar. All of this might seem diabolical, but the saloon-keeper was in no wise to blame for it. He was in the same plight as the manufacturer who has to adulterate and misrepresent his product. If he does not, some one else will; and the saloon-keeper, unless he is also an alderman, is apt to be in debt to the big brewers, and on the verge of being ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair

... careless and injudicious, and many write under the bias of party prejudice, which strangely perverts the judgment. By this, James Basnage could, in his History of the Jews, (b. 6,) notoriously mistake and misrepresent, by wholesale, the clearest authorities, to gratify his prepossession against an incontestable miracle, as the most learned Mr. Warburton hath demonstrated in his Julian, (b. 2, ch. 4.) Some write history as they would a tragedy or a romance; and, seeking at any rate to please ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler

... course Isaac T. Hopper belonged to that party, and advocated it with characteristic zeal. In fact, he seems to have been the Napoleon of the battle. It was not in his nature intentionally to misrepresent any man; and even when the controversy was raging most furiously, I believe there never was a time when he would not willingly have acknowledged a mistake the moment he perceived it. But his temperament was such, that wherever he deemed a principle of truth, justice, or freedom ...
— Isaac T. Hopper • L. Maria Child

... carefully refutes the notion that the doctrine of justification by faith encourages Antinomianism. Liberty does not mean licence. St. Paul was quite alive to the fact that skilful opponents and brainless admirers would misrepresent his doctrine, which was also Christ's. He therefore takes great pains to show that the connection between the righteousness of Christ and the righteousness of a Christian is not arbitrary or fictitious. His argument throughout implies ...
— The Books of the New Testament • Leighton Pullan

... dissenters, until a much later period. Happily they are now better known, and the truths of Christianity are more appreciated. I have been careful to guard the reader upon this subject, lest it should be thought that Bunyan had in any degree manifested the spirit of those, who even to the present day misrepresent the opinions of the Quakers. This may be occasioned by their distinguishing tenet—That the work of the ministry is purely a labour of love, and ought not to be performed for hire—derived from the command of Christ to his disciples, "Freely ye have received, freely give." This, however, is ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... turned on his heel, and was face to face with Cyrus Redgrave. Nothing could be suaver or more civil than Mr. Redgrave's accost; he spoke like a polished gentleman, and, for aught Harvey knew, did not misrepresent himself. But Rolfe had a prejudice; he said as little as ...
— The Whirlpool • George Gissing

... story,—a versatile woman. This talk has done me much good. I know the affection that exists between you and John, and I am confident that you would not misrepresent anything. ...
— Half a Rogue • Harold MacGrath

... to furnish reporters with copies of what they intend to say. The part of the task which requires skill is what is known as boiling down, condensing, or reducing the report to the dimensions required by editors. This involves: first and foremost, a determination not to misrepresent in any way what is said; second, the ability to select the essential points; third, an eye for such detail as may be used to spice the report without making it too long. Too many reporters, in ...
— Practical English Composition: Book II. - For the Second Year of the High School • Edwin L. Miller

... your neglect of them. As soon as you began to care about them, that care was exercised in sending persons to rule them in one department and another, who were, perhaps, the deputies of deputies to some members of this house, sent to spy out their liberties, to misrepresent their actions, and to prey upon them; men whose behaviour on many occasions has caused the blood of these sons of liberty to recoil within them.... They protected by your arms! They have nobly taken up arms in your ...
— The Eve of the Revolution - A Chronicle of the Breach with England, Volume 11 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Carl Becker

... at different times I have sent you, and which so fatally misrepresent our relative positions, have been sent to Edward; and this letter, of which I inclose you a copy, is the result. I will not attempt to make you understand what I have suffered—what I suffer. I dare not see you; I ...
— Ellen Middleton—A Tale • Georgiana Fullerton

... of the boyishness—for the turn-down-shirt-collar-ness of their tone:—but, as it is, you will pardon me, Mr. Editor, that I have been compelled to expose a 'critic' who courageously preserving his own anonymosity, takes advantage of my absence from the city to misrepresent, and thus vilify me, ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various

... Sangley traders. The Portuguese are making enormous profits, and this is ruining the citizens of the islands; moreover, they buy their goods from the Chinese at sufficient prices to satisfy the latter, and they misrepresent the condition and actions of the Spaniards, so that the Chinese are prevented from coming to Manila. The Portuguese will make no fair agreement as to prices, and some of them remain in Manila to sell their left-over goods; and these even ship goods to Nueva Espana in ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XXV, 1635-36 • Various

... imagine or infer that appearances misrepresent; hence one who suspects is inclined to look ...
— Orthography - As Outlined in the State Course of Study for Illinois • Elmer W. Cavins

... Craig, its late Governor, together with the causes which such events had originated, so that His Majesty might take such steps as would prevent the recurrence of a similar administration, an administration which tended to misrepresent the good and faithful people of the province, and to deprive them of the confidence and affection of His Majesty, and from feeling the good effects of his government, in the ample manner provided for by law. Nay, this was not all. It was moved that ...
— The Rise of Canada, from Barbarism to Wealth and Civilisation - Volume 1 • Charles Roger

... referred to it as the corner-stone of the independence. Dr. Leyds had chosen to associate himself with the defence of the concessionaires upon all occasions, and had even gone so far, as evidence given at the Industrial Commission showed, as to misrepresent the facts in their defence. The difficulty was how to explain the association of the State Attorney and State Secretary, in whose good intentions and integrity there was a general belief. The solution was to be found in the illusory promises of reform under the heading ...
— The Transvaal from Within - A Private Record of Public Affairs • J. P. Fitzpatrick

... an address of thanks, according to the usual custom, they presented a sullen remonstrance, complaining that a jealousy and distrust had been raised of their duty and affection; and desiring he would show marks of his high displeasure towards all persons who had presumed to misrepresent their proceedings to his majesty. He declared, in his answer, that no person had ever dared to misrepresent their proceedings, and that if any should presume to impose upon him by such calumnies, he would treat them ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett

... all, I believe, he felt that his heart was in the work of his chair, and that with a dual position of pastor and professor, he had the widest scope for the exercise of his best powers, and the fullest opportunity for the realization of his highest ambitions. I think I do not misrepresent him when I say it. But when the pulpit of this church became vacant, the eyes of the congregation turned to him. Occupying a foremost place in the denomination to which it belongs, it called for a strong man who could administer with great ability its affairs and maintain the high standard of spiritual ...
— Joy in Service; Forgetting, and Pressing Onward; Until the Day Dawn • George Tybout Purves

... foundation in truth, and I... suspect who... in a word... this arrow... in a word, your mamma... She seemed to me in other things, with all her excellent qualities, of a somewhat high-flown and romantic way of thinking.... But I was a thousand miles from supposing that she would misunderstand and misrepresent things in so fanciful a ...
— Crime and Punishment • Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... grouped themselves around General McClellan, believing to have found in him the man after their own heart. That cesspool of all infamies, the New York Herald, became the mouthpiece of all the like hypocrites. They and the Herald were the first to pervert and to misrepresent the indignation evoked by the do-nothing or nobody-hurt strategy, and to call it the abolition ...
— Diary from March 4, 1861, to November 12, 1862 • Adam Gurowski

... made to appear as truth, by which human laws are substituted for the law of God, and men are led to worship the creature rather than the Creator, may be traced in all the history of the past. Satan's efforts to misrepresent the character of God, to cause men to cherish a false conception of the Creator, and thus to regard Him with fear and hate rather than with love; his endeavors to set aside the divine law, leading the people to think themselves free from its requirements; ...
— The Great Controversy Between Christ and Satan • Ellen G. White

... misconstruction;—it was in these words, 'I'll be —— if you get one foot of land here;' and thereupon the parties joined issue. On this, war was declared against him by his Excellency in Council, and every means were used to annoy him here, and misrepresent his proceedings at home; but he stood firm, and by an occasional visit to the Colonial Office in England, he opened the eyes of ministers to the proceedings of both parties, and for awhile averted the danger. At length, some five years ago, finding the enemy was getting too strong for him, he ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XX. No. 557., Saturday, July 14, 1832 • Various

... importance of the transactions of his own age, and to imagine that posterity will have nothing to do but to recount them. He is much mistaken; they forget or care not a doit for nine tenths of what he does; and misrepresent ...
— The Eclipse of Faith - Or, A Visit To A Religious Sceptic • Henry Rogers

... her the opportunity of referring to the keyhole incidents only to have her ignore the opening altogether. It was equally apparent that she had no intention of mentioning Jimmy Stiles, and he was half inclined to regret the lead he had given her in this connection. Why had she been so eager to misrepresent the situation? Why had Stiles disappeared so suddenly? What was the meaning of the attack by these two ruffians? Was robbery really the motive, or was she lying about that, too? He had seen no sign of a purse. Why had she and young Stiles ...
— Every Man for Himself • Hopkins Moorhouse

... striking results, both great and small, may be produced by an extension of a principle which may be described as that of sympathetic vibration. Illustrations taken from the physical plane seem generally to misrepresent rather than elucidate astral phenomena, because they can never be more than partially applicable; but the recollection of two simple facts of ordinary life may help to make this important branch of our subject clearer, if we are careful not to push the analogy ...
— The Astral Plane - Its Scenery, Inhabitants and Phenomena • C. W. Leadbeater

... everything'; and, of course, she, at the age of eighteen, has more feeling than Juliet, that 'flapper,' could have had. All those other things—those little technical tricks—'can be picked up,' or 'will come.' But no; I misrepresent our young lady. If she be conscious that there are such tricks to be played, she despises them. When, later, she finds the need to learn them, she still despises them. It seems to her ridiculous that one should not speak and comport oneself as ...
— Yet Again • Max Beerbohm

... but not one that could be printed in this book. And to mutilate it would be to misrepresent it. It is to be found in any great library. Suffice it to say that murder of a layman was much cheaper than many crimes my lay readers would deem light ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade

... person has been endeavoring to misrepresent Sir Arthur. I wish you would not listen to such stuff. I am certain that he is immensely wealthy, and then think ...
— Marguerite Verne • Agatha Armour

... sayings are true. Scott was not always accurate as to facts and sinned freely against chronology. But he rescued a wide realm from cold oblivion and gave it back to human consciousness and sympathy. It is treating the past more kindly to misrepresent it in some particulars, than to leave it a blank to the imagination. The eighteenth-century historians were incurious of life. Their spirit was general and abstract; they were in search of philosophical formulas. Gibbon covers his subject with a lava-flood of stately rhetoric which stiffens into ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Nineteenth Century • Henry A. Beers

... crediting this statement, since it would have done Robert no good to misrepresent the facts of the case. He resolved, however, to ask the captain about it, and inquire how it happened that he had been received as a passenger, contrary to the ...
— Brave and Bold • Horatio Alger, Jr.

... look most unlike a woman;—the straight line of the waist and the swelling curve below it, which meet in such a sharp, unmitigated angle. Look at the Venus yonder,—she is naked to the hips,—and see how utterly these lines misrepresent those of Nature. You will find no instance of such a contour as is formed by the meeting of these lines among all living creatures, except, perhaps, when a turtle thrusts his head and his tail out of ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various

... sorely the separation from her. The consequence of this was that the saintly woman, the sister of mercy, took, after some time, pity upon her suffering worshipper, and once more sacrificed herself. Not to misrepresent her account, the only one we have, of this change in the domestic arrangements of the two friends, I shall faithfully transcribe ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks

... father and resigned to defeat, Isidore Beautrelet, in the end, was unable to persuade himself to keep silence. The truth was too beautiful and too curious, the proofs which he was able to produce were too logical and too conclusive for him to consent to misrepresent it. The whole world was waiting for his revelations. ...
— The Hollow Needle • Maurice Leblanc

... dispersed among them. It is the method which has prevailed in periods of large reading but with little inceptive force of their own, like that of the Alexandrian Neo-Platonism in the third century, or the Neo- Platonism of Florence in the fifteenth. Its natural defect is in the tendency to misrepresent the true character of the doctrine it professes to explain, that it may harmonise thus the better with the other elements ...
— Plato and Platonism • Walter Horatio Pater

... you do succeed. You have to shout, and Strattons don't shout; you have to be smart and tricky and there's never been a smart and tricky Stratton yet; you have to snatch opportunities and get the better of the people and misrepresent the realities of every case you touch. You're a paid misrepresenter. They say you'll get a fellowship, Stephen. Why not stay up, and do some thinking for a year or so. There'll be enough to keep you. ...
— The Passionate Friends • Herbert George Wells

... murderer did you ever misrepresent the character, acts, motives and intentions of the man that he murdered—never mind the purpose and effect of ...
— The Shadow On The Dial, and Other Essays - 1909 • Ambrose Bierce

... partly thrown in joke. But it is pretty certain that if a man not in politics takes them seriously, he will have more or less mud, not to say stones, thrown at him. He might burlesque or caricature them, or misrepresent them, with safety; but if he spoke of public questions with heart and conscience, he could not do it with impunity, unless he were authorized to do so by some practical relation to them. I do not mean that then he would escape; but in this ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... admirable, though much abused, administration of the government of India.[8] Still, however, the inconvenience and delay of prosecution in our courts are so great, and the chance of the ultimate conviction of great offenders is so small, that strong temptations are held out to the police to conceal or misrepresent the character of crimes; and they must have a great feeling of security in their tenure of office, and more adequate salaries, better chances of rising, and better supervision over them, before they will resist such ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman

... singular character has, I believe, been fairly transmitted to us. The reign of his immediate successor was short and busy; and the historians who wrote before the elevation of the family of Constantine could not have the most remote interest to misrepresent the character of Gallienus.] ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon

... here they would have been not only useless and ungovernable themselves, but an actual hindrance to the rest; and further, being conscious to themselves of the neglect of their duty, they would be less ready to misrepresent the action, or raise a cry against them at their return home. When the enemy drew nigh, he bade his men stand to their arms, until he had finished the sacrifice, in which he spent a considerable ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough

... utmost astonishment, and vowed by all that was sacred, that he was innocent of the most important part of the charge. He told me, that it was his ill fortune, and he supposed he was not singular, to have enemies, that made it their business to misrepresent every circumstance of his conduct. He had been calumniated, cruelly calumniated, and could he discover the author of the aspersion, he would vindicate his honour with his sword. In fine, he explained the whole business in such a manner, ...
— Italian Letters, Vols. I and II • William Godwin

... in a dilemma. He saw that he should be forced to misrepresent, and this he did not like. On the other hand, he could not tell the truth, and so betray ...
— The Young Explorer • Horatio Alger

... not win Dakota that year, but Miss Anthony bore the disappointment with the serenity she always showed. To her a failure was merely another opportunity, and I mention our experience here only to show of what she was capable in her gallant seventies. But I should misrepresent her if I did not show her human and sentimental side as well. With all her detachment from human needs she had emotional moments, and of these the most satisfying came when she was listening to music. She knew nothing whatever about music, but was ...
— The Story of a Pioneer - With The Collaboration Of Elizabeth Jordan • Anna Howard Shaw

... Jealous are they of each other; some ill-constituted, others shaken with intestine divisions, and, if I may be allowed the expression, parsimonious even to prodigality. Our assemblies are diffident of their governors, governors despise their assemblies; and both mutually misrepresent each other to the Court of Great Britain." Military measures, he proceeds, demand secrecy and despatch; but when so many divided provinces must agree to join in them, secrecy and despatch are impossible. In conclusion he exclaims: ...
— Montcalm and Wolfe • Francis Parkman

... sight can be more obvious, than that in all religious matters, none could make over the right of judging for himself, since that would cause his religion to be absolutely at the disposal of another." At his rate of arguing (I think I do not misrepresent him, and I believe he will not deny the consequence) a man may profess Heathenism, Mahometism, &c. and gain as many proselytes as he can; and they may have their assemblies, and the magistrate ought to protect them, provided they do not disturb the state: And they may enjoy all secular preferments, ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. III.: Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church, Vol. I. • Jonathan Swift

... petulantly. 'How I dislike a man to misrepresent things! He said there was not time for ...
— The Hand of Ethelberta • Thomas Hardy

... I need not assure you I had not. The malevolence of party has alone the merit of such an imputation. For reasons of state, we desired to observe a certain course towards the man, and Orange malignity is pleased to misrepresent and calumniate us.' ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever

... stronger terms: "If, then, the doctrines of grace [Calvinism] are plainly taught in the Scriptures, if they accord with the experience of Christians, and enter largely into their prayers, then it must be exceedingly sinful to oppose and misrepresent them. Those who do this will eventually be found fighting against God. We have recently heard of persons praying publicly against the election of grace, and we wonder that their tongues did not cleave to the roof of their mouth in giving ...
— The Calvinistic Doctrine of Predestination Examined and Refuted • Francis Hodgson

... he cannot be the author for this reason: the pamphlet reasserts something about Melbourne which he had asserted in one of his articles in the 'Edinburgh Review.' Melbourne, when he read that article, wrote to Brougham, and told him that as he was sure he did not wish to misrepresent him, he informed him that he had never entertained the opinions nor given the vote there ascribed to him. Brougham replied, admitting his error, and promising to correct it, offering to do so at Melbourne's option in another number of the 'Edinburgh Review,' or in some other ...
— The Greville Memoirs (Second Part) - A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1852 - (Volume 1 of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville

... growth of scientific abstaining principles—which they cannot avoid recognizing—with positive dread. The extremists on this side are indeed extreme in their fanaticism. They shut their eyes to the most obvious facts, and do not hesitate in their blindness to misrepresent the most obvious truths. They affirm that under the influence of total abstinence and, by inference, because of total abstinence, the yearly decreasing death-rate of the population is accompanied by reduction of vitality; that people who live long are more enfeebled than those who live short lives ...
— Alcohol: A Dangerous and Unnecessary Medicine, How and Why - What Medical Writers Say • Martha M. Allen

... arguments "by substituting the concrete, God, for the abstract, Absolute;" i.e., by substituting God for something which Hamilton defines as contradictory to the nature of God. Can the force of confusion go further? Is it possible for perverse criticism more utterly, we do not say to misrepresent, but literally to invert ...
— The Philosophy of the Conditioned • H. L. Mansel

... and mental strength, and devote themselves to the culture of the peaceful and the good. That is my last confession. If you understand me, and it satisfies you, give me your hand, and we are reconciled; if you wish to continue to misrepresent me and condemn my course, farewell! for, in that case, our ...
— Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia • L. Muhlbach

... was running from them at the wharf as an evidence that she was leaking badly. {40} The crowd of natives was enormous, and the foreigners were there in hundreds. She was loading with oranges and green bananas up to the last moment,—those tasteless bananas which, out of the tropics, misrepresent this most ...
— The Hawaiian Archipelago • Isabella L. Bird

... people who openly ridicule both total abstinence and its advocates, and some, who are wicked enough to endeavor to misrepresent those who labor in this cause. These persons do not always succeed, however, as the following incident will show: Horace Greeley was once met at a railway depot by a red-faced individual, who shook him warmly by the hand. "I don't recognize you," said ...
— The True Citizen, How To Become One • W. F. Markwick, D. D. and W. A. Smith, A. B.

... do nothing to defend herself. The very improvement in Henry's circumstances held her back. She could not write to him and say, "Now I know you are Mr. Raby's nephew, that makes all the difference." That would only give him fresh offense, and misrepresent herself; for in truth she had repented her letter long before the ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade

... question, when the confederacy appeared too strong; it was then they used the means with which their power and their courage furnished them; and, 'attacked upon all sides, they carried everywhere their defensive arms' (vide M. Talleyrand's note). I do not wish to misrepresent the learned gentleman, but I understood him to speak of this sentiment with approbation: the sentiment itself is this, that if a nation is unjustly attacked in any one quarter by others, she cannot stop to consider ...
— Selected Speeches on British Foreign Policy 1738-1914 • Edgar Jones

... told him that the smallest direct interest in the issue of the controversy, disqualified a witness with us, from the strong bias it created to misrepresent facts, and ...
— A Voyage to the Moon • George Tucker

... this spirit in judging of people. You know quite well, Alfred, how easy it is to see the whole story in quite another way. You begin by a harsh and worldly judgment, and it leads you to misrepresent all that follows. I refuse to believe that Godfrey Eldon married Mrs. ...
— Demos • George Gissing

... of him," Jean retorted, "and you should not misrepresent him. The people love him for his pure and simple manner of living. He goes among them that he might know how they live, for he wants to help them all he can. They call him 'Farmer George,' so I have heard my father say, ...
— The King's Arrow - A Tale of the United Empire Loyalists • H. A. Cody

... day misrepresent his party, or his successor, or has the party changed and the successor also? Had the virtuous impulses of November faded away in February? Was there a change of heart or a change of opportunity? Neither Congress nor ...
— The Vote That Made the President • David Dudley Field

... herself playful and yet grave, melancholy and yet quite rational. Her daily occupations interested her very little—there was an order of sentiments of a less transitory kind. She complained of the poets, who misrepresent the facts of life, then she raised her eyes towards heaven, asking of him what was the ...
— Sentimental Education, Volume II - The History of a Young Man • Gustave Flaubert

... many a free and independent spirit is there, who criticises with a keener eye than is his wont, the sayings and doings of his commanding officer, solely because he is such. How apt is such an one to misrepresent a word, or create a wrong motive for an action! how slow in giving praise, lest he should be deemed one of the servile train! Pass we over the host of petty intrigues—the myriads of conflicting interests:—show not how the partial report of a favourite, may make the one in authority unjust to ...
— A Love Story • A Bushman

... with their countrymen. And as for the empty promises and delusive hopes which they set before you, so extreme is their desire to return home that they naturally believe many things which are untrue, and designedly misrepresent many others; so that between their beliefs and what they say they believe, they fill you with false impressions, on which if you build, your labour is in vain, and you are led to engage in enterprises from which nothing but ruin ...
— Discourses on the First Decade of Titus Livius • Niccolo Machiavelli

... but one, or at most two exceptions, all the newspapers which she had patronized declared against her, and were throughout the struggle the bitterest and most abusive of her opponents. The Voluntaries, too, joined with redoubled vehemence in the cry raised to drown her voice, and misinterpret and misrepresent her claims. The general current of opinion ran strongly against her. My minister, warmly interested in the success of the Non-Intrusion principle, has told me, that for many months past I was the only man in his parish that seemed thoroughly to sympathize with him; and I have no doubt that the ...
— My Schools and Schoolmasters - or The Story of my Education. • Hugh Miller

... Nobility were about Twenty six, whereof Five did at last comply with their List, as they thought, being in publick Commands, supposing it might give a Handle to their Enemies, to misrepresent them to their Soveraign; but they nevertheless, upon all Occasions, testified their Dislike and Abhorrence of the Method, and of the Conduct ...
— Atalantis Major • Daniel Defoe

... has gone the round of the world as a crushing blow to socialist ideals. The same thought has been repeated by every politician, newspaper, and capitalist who has undertaken to refute socialism. And every socialist will admit that of all the attempts to misrepresent socialism and to make it abhorrent to most people the idea expressed in these words of Bakounin has been the most effective. To state thus the ideal of socialism is sufficient in most cases to end all argument. Add to this program military discipline for the masses, barracks for homes, ...
— Violence and the Labor Movement • Robert Hunter

... does not give it fairly; for I have looked at Chappe D'Auteroche[1011], from whom he has taken it. He stops where it is said that the spectators thought her innocent, and leaves out what follows; that she nevertheless was guilty. Now this is being as culpable as one can conceive, to misrepresent fact in a book, and for what motive? It is like one of those lies which people tell, one cannot see why. The woman's life was spared; and no punishment was too great for the favourite of an Empress who had conspired to dethrone ...
— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell

... opinion of this meeting, considering the ill-disguised efforts of the Times and other misleading journals to misrepresent public opinion here on all American questions ... to decry democratic institutions under the trials to which the Republic is exposed, it is the duty of the working-men especially as unrepresented in the National Senate to express their sympathy ...
— Great Britain and the American Civil War • Ephraim Douglass Adams

... liable, among others to the cruelties of a savage foe; they grew by your neglect of them. As soon as you began to care for them, that care was exercised in sending persons to rule them, to spy out their liberties, to misrepresent their actions and to prey upon them; men whose behavior on many occasions has caused the blood of those sons of liberty to recoil within them; men promoted to the highest seats of justice, some who, to my knowledge, were glad, by going to a foreign country, to escape ...
— Something of Men I Have Known - With Some Papers of a General Nature, Political, Historical, and Retrospective • Adlai E. Stevenson

... section of the English people who seem to think that it shows patriotism and a becoming national pride to belittle the work of other nations and speak of it in an insolent tone of contempt. They habitually misrepresent the achievements of foreigners in order to make them appear ridiculous. Over twenty years ago a writer in one of our high-class magazines informed an astonished world that "the Wagner-bubble has burst!" and the preposterous ...
— Wagner's Tristan und Isolde • George Ainslie Hight

... many. An invidious and inquisitorial scrutiny into the personal dispositions of public officers will creep through the whole Union, and the most selfish and sordid passions will be kindled into activity to distort the conduct and misrepresent the feelings of men whose places may become the prize of slander ...
— John Quincy Adams - American Statesmen Series • John. T. Morse

... taught both by precept and example, that towards masters neither honour was to be recognised, nor respect to be considered due. To cheat them, to lie to them, to annoy them in every possible way—to misrepresent their motives, mimic their defects, and calumniate their actions—was the conduct which he inaugurated towards them; and for the time that he continued at Roslyn the whole lower-school was a Pandemonium of ...
— Eric, or Little by Little • Frederic W. Farrar

... new Sol invictus Elagabal furnished a pretext.[26] However, the question arises whether the Roman historians, being very hostile to that foreigner who haughtily favored the customs of his own country, did not misrepresent or partly misunderstand the facts. Heliogabalus's attempt to have his god recognized as supreme, and to establish a kind of monotheism in heaven as there was monarchy on earth, was undoubtedly too violent, ...
— The Oriental Religions in Roman Paganism • Franz Cumont

... and healed him. Only Luke, "the beloved physician," mentions this "unique miracle of surgery." The incident has its message for disciples in all ages. Violence and cruelty in the defense of the cause of Christ misrepresent him to the world. The act of Peter gave countenance to charges which would be preferred against Jesus, and further resistance would have compromised the position of his Lord. However well intended, such rash defenses ...
— The Gospel of Luke, An Exposition • Charles R. Erdman

... and turning on his side, gazed at the dying fire. "Vivian," said he, "it all depends on how your folks bring you up. Down home we buy and sell by ages. A cow is a cow, a steer is a steer, according to his age, and so on down to the end of the alphabet. The cattle never misrepresent and there's no occasion for seeing them. If you are laboring under the idea that my old man would use any deception to sell a herd, you have another guess coming. He'd rather lose his right hand than to misrepresent the color of a cow. He's as jealous ...
— Wells Brothers • Andy Adams

... of a prominent institution said lately that the chief difficulty that he had with his men was to make them always tell the truth. For the sake of making an important sale they were often inclined to misrepresent his goods. "But nothing," he added, "will so surely kill all business as misrepresentation." Even a gambling book-maker on the race tracks in New York, before such work was forbidden by law, is ...
— The Making of a Nation - The Beginnings of Israel's History • Charles Foster Kent and Jeremiah Whipple Jenks

... about dragons, I am persuaded that the antients sometimes did wilfully misrepresent things, in order to increase the wonder. Iphicrates related, that in Mauritania there were dragons of such extent, that grass grew upon their backs: [303][Greek: Drakontas te legei megalous, hoste kai poan epipephukenai.] What can be meant under this representation but a Dracontium, within whose ...
— A New System; or, an Analysis of Antient Mythology. Volume II. (of VI.) • Jacob Bryant

... by ([Greek: en]) an hundred.' Tischendorf notes that besides all the uncials which are furnished with accents and breathings (viz. EFGHKMUV[Symbol: Pi]) 'nearly 100 cursives' exhibit [Greek: en] here and in ver. 20. But this is to misrepresent the case. All the cursives may be declared to exhibit [Greek: en], e.g. all Matthaei's and all Scrivener's. I have myself with this object examined a large number of Evangelia, and found [Greek: en] in all. The Basle MS. from which Erasmus derived his text[127] exhibits [Greek: ...
— The Causes of the Corruption of the Traditional Text of the Holy Gospels • John Burgon

... the sitting of the chamber of peers, in spite of the pains taken to misrepresent it, roused the attention of the Duke of Otranto, and of the Anti-Napoleon faction, of which he was become ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. II • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon

... it is not at all fair to misrepresent it by saying that God cruelly stereotypes a man's soul at death and will refuse him permission to repent after death however much he may want to. The voice of the Holy Ghost within tells us that this could never be true of the Father. We must believe that through all Eternity, if the worst sinner ...
— The Gospel of the Hereafter • J. Paterson-Smyth

... possessed others, which are not usual among the poets of our nation, and which, whencesoever they had come to him personally, had not, before they made their appearance in him, seemed indigenous to the English soil. It would indeed be easy to misrepresent the history of English poetry, during the period which Chaucer's advent may be said to have closed, by ascribing to it a uniformly solemn and serious, or even dark and gloomy, character. Such a description ...
— Chaucer • Adolphus William Ward

... the early history of the Loyalists of America has never been written, except to blacken their character and misrepresent their actions; they were represented as a set of idle office-seekers—an imputation which has been amply refuted by their braving the forests of northern countries, and converting them into fruitful fields, developing trade and ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 2 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Edgerton Ryerson

... mentioned—the frequent innocence of the producer of the imitation and the extreme difficulty of detecting the modern origin of the work. The facts are very little known, because it was the interest of many persons to misrepresent and conceal them. They ought, nevertheless, to be known, and I do not see any good reason why I should not ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - Vol. XVII, No. 102. June, 1876. • Various

... finds himself wrong. But can we, for that reason, run ahead, and infer that he will make any particular change, of which he himself has given no intimation? Can we safely base our action upon any such vague inference? Now, as ever, I wish not to misrepresent Judge Douglas's position, question his motives, or do aught that can be personally offensive to him. Whenever, if ever, he and we can come together on principle, so that our cause may have assistance from his great ability, I hope to have interposed no adventitious obstacle. ...
— American Eloquence, Volume III. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1897) • Various

... heard something about it,' said Picotee, blushing with anger. 'It was nothing at all like that. I wonder Mr. Neigh had the audacity ever to talk of the matter, and to misrepresent ...
— The Hand of Ethelberta • Thomas Hardy

... Western; whence designing men may endeavor to excite a belief, that there is a real difference of local interests and views. One of the expedients of party to acquire influence, within particular districts, is to misrepresent the opinions and aims of other districts. You cannot shield yourselves too much against the jealousies and heart-burnings, which spring from these misrepresentations; they tend to render alien to each other those who ought to be bound together by fraternal ...
— Washington's Birthday • Various

... playing. There she had recently recited the "Marseillaise" to frenzied Paris; and there, in the vestibule, genius of French comedy, of French intellect, and of French life, sits the wonderful Voltaire of Houdon, the statue which, for the first time, after the dreadful portraits which misrepresent him, gives the spectator some adequate idea of the personal appearance and impression of the man who moulded an age. You can scarcely see the statue without a shudder. It is remorseless intellect laid ...
— Literary and Social Essays • George William Curtis

... Gorting and other Independents have broached a milder form of the same heresy. In his Notes (pp. 144,145) he quotes sentences to the amount of a page from Milton's Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce to prove that he does not misrepresent him.—The "Gorting" here mentioned by Baillie is the "Samuel Gorton" who had been such a sore trouble to the New Englanders, and even to Roger Williams at Providence, by his anarchical opinions ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson

... wilt have one page, at least, within thy covers, which Malice will not blacken, and which Ignorance cannot misrepresent. ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne

... hypocrisy of the dominant parties were all that politics had to offer. The Lawrence strike touched the most impervious: story after story came to our ears of hardened reporters who suddenly refused to misrepresent the strikers, of politicians aroused to action, of social workers become revolutionary. Daily conversation was shocked into some contact with realities—the newspapers actually printed facts about the situation ...
— A Preface to Politics • Walter Lippmann

... of this despicable faction is distinguished by plebeian grossness, and savage indecency. To misrepresent the actions and the principles of their enemies is common to all parties; but the insolence of invective, and brutality of reproach, which have lately prevailed, are ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 6 - Reviews, Political Tracts, and Lives of Eminent Persons • Samuel Johnson

... it is more than possible, from our imperfect acquaintance with their language, and total ignorance of the character and bent of their thoughts upon such points, that we are very likely to misunderstand and misrepresent their real opinions. It appears to me that different tribes give a different account of their belief, but all generally so absurd, so vague, unsatisfactory, and contradictory, that it is impossible at present to say with any certainty what they really believe, or whether they have any independent ...
— Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central • Edward John Eyre

... representative companies whose spheres of life are interblended." (Id., p. 15.) By this "interblending" is of course meant only a perfect sympathy and community of thought; and I should doubtless misrepresent the author quoted were I to claim an entire identity of the idea he wishes to convey, and that now under consideration. Yet what, after all, is sympathy but the loosening of that hard "astringent" quality (to use Bohme's phrase) wherein ...
— Five Years Of Theosophy • Various

... his part there was no desire of concealment; nor did he ever express to me a wish to suppress an account of any act of his whole life. So far as I could judge, his only apprehensions were that "kind friends," as he sometimes termed them, by attempts at explanation, might unintentionally misrepresent acts ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis

... to the head and to the heart. Whoever seeks, therefore, by the production of Shakespearean drama chiefly to please the spectator's eye shows scant respect both for the dramatist and for the spectator. However unwittingly, he tends to misrepresent the one, and to mislead the other, in a particular of first-rate importance. Indeed, excess in scenic display does worse than restrict opportunities of witnessing Shakespeare's plays on the stage in London and other large cities of England and America. It ...
— Shakespeare and the Modern Stage - with Other Essays • Sir Sidney Lee

... is "profitable for reproof and correction." It contains no doctrine very pleasant to men's natural humours, but it is indeed most pleasant to a right and ordered taste. You know, the distemper of the eye, or the perverting of the taste, will misrepresent pleasant things, and sweet things to the senses, and make them appear ill savoured and bitter. But, I say, to a discerning spirit there is nothing so sweet, so comely. "I have seen an end of all perfection," but none of thy law. "Thy ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning

... confess themselves modestly uncertain. The professional theologians alone are loud and confident; but they speak in the old angry tone which rarely accompanies deep and wise convictions. They do not meet the real difficulties; they mistake them, misrepresent them, claim victories over adversaries with whom they have never even crossed swords, and leap to conclusions with a precipitancy at which we can only smile. It has been the unhappy manner of their class from immemorial time; they call it zeal for the Lord, as if it were beyond all doubt that ...
— Short Studies on Great Subjects • James Anthony Froude

... knowledge avails them little. The immediate pressure of the temptation is yielded to, and Sincerity remains a text to be preached to others. To gain applause they will misstate facts, to gain victory in argument they will misrepresent the opinions they oppose; and they suppress the rising misgivings by the dangerous sophism that to discredit error is good work, and by the hope that no one will detect the means by which the work is effected. The saddest aspect of this procedure ...
— The Principles of Success in Literature • George Henry Lewes

... officers for the crown, bailiffs, attorneys, clerks of the court, procurators, solicitors, and agents of various kinds, represent or misrepresent Justice. The "lawyer" and the bailiff's men (commonly called "the brokers") are the two lowest rungs of the ladder. Now, the bailiff's man is an outsider, an adventitious minister of justice, appearing to see that ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac

... for you?" She held him an instant as with the fine intelligence of his meaning in this, and then, though not with sharpness, broke out: "Why are you trying to make out that you're nasty and stingy? Why do you misrepresent—?" ...
— The Awkward Age • Henry James

... policy," is a maxim which merchants and tradesmen will find as true as it is trite, and no tradesman who wishes to retain his customers and his reputation will knowingly misrepresent the quality of his goods. It is not good policy for a merchant or clerk, in selling goods, to tell the customer what they cost, as, in a majority of cases, ...
— Our Deportment - Or the Manners, Conduct and Dress of the Most Refined Society • John H. Young



Words linked to "Misrepresent" :   juggle, feign, falsify, fudge, cheat, represent, manipulate, cook, dissemble, affect, misrepresentation, sentimentalize, belie, fake



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