He knew the cold-blooded
insincerity of them, for, at night, when he was brought to Del Mar's room, he heard only the cold brittle tones, sensed only the threat and the menace of the other's personality, felt, when touched by the other's hand, only a stiffness and sharpness of contact that was like to so much steel or wood in so far as all subtle tenderness of heart and spirit was absent.
When he sat with his elbows on the dusty writing table in the deathlike stillness of the study, calm and significant memories of the last few days rose one after another in his imagination, particularly of the battle of Borodino and of that vague sense of his own insignificance and
insincerity compared with the truth, simplicity, and strength of the class of men he mentally classed as they.
Kitty knew that this
insincerity came from his love for his brother, from his sense of shame at being too happy, and above all from his unflagging craving to be better--she loved it in him, and so she smiled.
He had discovered in this affair a delicate and perplexing side, forcing upon the discoverer a certain amount of
insincerity - that sort of
insincerity which, under the names of skill, prudence, discretion, turns up at one point or another in most human affairs.
The glaring
insincerity of these sermons was not sufficient to compass the banishment of the fashion from the schools, and it is not sufficient to-day; it never will be sufficient while the world stands, perhaps.
He fled to his usual refuge, that of hoping for some unforeseen turn of fortune, some favourable chance which would save him from unpleasant consequences-- perhaps even justify his
insincerity by manifesting its prudence.
Nor indeed can there be a better proof of the
insincerity and affectation of some of the zealous adversaries of the plan of the convention among us, who profess to be the devoted admirers of the government under which they live, than the fury with which they have attacked that plan, for matters in regard to which our own constitution is equally or perhaps more vulnerable.
It throws a shadow of
insincerity over their most deeply felt emotions.
Elinor saw, and pitied her for, the neglect of abilities which education might have rendered so respectable; but she saw, with less tenderness of feeling, the thorough want of delicacy, of rectitude, and integrity of mind, which her attentions, her assiduities, her flatteries at the Park betrayed; and she could have no lasting satisfaction in the company of a person who joined
insincerity with ignorance; whose want of instruction prevented their meeting in conversation on terms of equality, and whose conduct toward others made every shew of attention and deference towards herself perfectly valueless.
Before three soft speeches have escaped me I rebuke myself for folly and
insincerity. Before a caress has had time to cool, a strenuous revulsion seizes me: I long to return to my old lonely ascetic hermit life; to my dry books; my Socialist propagandism; my voyage of discovery through the wilderness of thought.
Adam dared not plead again, for Dinah's was not the voice of caprice or
insincerity. But it was very hard for him; his eyes got dim as he looked at her.
I didn't know then her shrinking from all falsehood and evasion; her dread of
insincerity and disloyalty of every kind.