economical with the truth

形容词 adj.
中文释义

英文释义

形容词 adj.
  1. Not telling the whole truth, especially in order to present a false image of a situation; untruthful; lying. Often used with sarcasm or satire. euphemistic,idiomatic
    — I would be acting economical with the truth if I were to tell you that I was enjoying myself.

词源

Believed to be from a quotation by the British-Irish statesman and philosopher Edmund Burke (1729–1797): “Falsehood and delusion are allowed in no case whatever: But, as in the exercise of all the virtues, there is an œconomy of truth. It is a sort of temperance, by which a man speaks truth with measure that he may speak it the longer.”
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