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evice; fraud. Making the ephah small and the shekel great, and falsifying the balances by deceit. Amos viii. 5. Friendly to man, far from deceit or guile. Milton. Yet still we hug the dear deceit. N. Cotton.

Full of, or characterized by, deceit; serving to mislead or insnare; trickish; fraudulent; cheating; insincere. Harboring foul deceitful thoughts. Shak.

With intent to deceive.

The disposition to deceive; as, a man's deceitfulness may be habitual.

Free from deceit. Bp. Hall.

The act of deceiving one's self, or the state of being self- deceived; self-deception.

To practice deceit. [Obs.] Barrow.

In or with good faith; without fraud or deceit; real or really; actual or actually; genuine or genuinely; as, you must proceed bona fide; a bona fide purchaser or transaction.

Deceitful. [Obs.] Since Frenchmen are so braid, Marry that will, I live and die a maid. Shak.

or become diseased, or as if diseased, with canker; to grow corrupt; to become venomous. Deceit and cankered malice. Dryden. As with age his body uglier grows, So his mind cankers. Shak.

Craft; deceit; falseness. [Obs.] Shak.

Crafty; deceitful; false. [Obs.] Shak. -- Cau"te*lous*ly, adv. -- Cau"te*lous*ness, n. [Obs.]

A deceitful, tricky dealer or horse jockey. [Colloq.] He was a horse chaunter; he's a leg now. Dickens.

A ball of thread, yarn, or cord; also, The thread itself. Untwisting his deceitful clew. Spenser.

rdant. [Obs.] Instruct my daughter how she shall persever, That time and place, with this deceit so lawful, May prove coherent. Shak.

A secret agreement and cooperation for a fraudulent or deceitful purpose; a playing into each other's hands; deceit; fraud; cunning. The foxe, maister of collusion. Spenser. That they [miracles] be done publicly, in the face of the world, that there may be no room to suspect artifice and collusion. Atterbury. By the ig…

Anything done deceitfully, and which could not be properly designated by any special name, whether belonging to contracts or not. Burrill.

The counsel of the Lord standeth forever. Ps. xxxiii. 11. The counsels of the wicked are deceit. Prov. xii. 5.

Assuming the appearance of something; false; spurious; deceitful; hypocritical; as, a counterfeit philanthropist. "An arrant counterfeit rascal." Shak.

Deceit; fraud; artifice. [Obs.] Chaucer.