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sycophant
in a sentence

show 35 more with this conextual meaning
  • He set up a government within the government-by moving the decimal points in appropriations and salaries, sending his speechless enemies to tiny towns in Calabria, and rewarding sycophants with sinecures.†   (source)
  • They are constantly bombarded by the wiles of parasites and sycophants, by the snares of the ambitious, the avaricious, the desperate, by the artifices of men who have more confidence than they deserve, and of those who seek to possess rather than to deserve it.†   (source)
  • It would demean the Professor needlessly, would place too much emphasis on the sycophancy he had occasionally displayed in the face of manifestations of German might and potency, to portray him as buffoonishly servile in Duffield's presence; he possesses, after all, his own illustrious repute as a scholar and an expert in his field.†   (source)
  • Skimberry aroused suspicion in many quarters because of his sycophantic allegiance to Ezra Bennington.†   (source)
  • Sycophantic laugh.†   (source)
  • "That sounds good, sir," said Ernie sycophantically, rubbing his hands together.   (source)
    sycophantically = in a manner of one overly eager to please someone in authority in order to gain personal advantage
  • Malfoy laughed loudly and sycophantically.   (source)
  • He was a sycophant to Stalin.
    sycophant = a person who tries to flatter or please someone in authority in order to gain personal advantage
  • When complimenting a trait in someone, share at least one concrete example so they know it is not the empty flattery of a sycophant.
  • Someone in the crowd around the lifts called sycophantically, "Morning, Yaxley!"†   (source)
  • "Yeah," said Ron sycophantically, "that makes sense."†   (source)
  • Anyone who is not a German wants the Germans dead, even the most sycophantic of them.†   (source)
  • Sycophant—a servile flatterer," she twanged proudly like she was giving an answer in English class.†   (source)
  • Once upon a time fairly recently, in fact—Molly would've gagged over these words, both because they're blatantly sycophantic and cringingly sentimental.†   (source)
  • And her stuck-up flock of sycophants.†   (source)
  • In his letter his sycophantic inclinations bubbled to the surface a couple of times, as did his complete ignorance about the island.†   (source)
  • In rapid translation Sophie told him that the message (characteristically sycophantic) was from a local subcontractor, a supplier of gravel to the German operators of the camp concrete factory, who said that he would be unable to transport the required amount of gravel in the required time, begging the Commandant's indulgence, due to the extremely soggy condition of the ground around his quarry that had not only caused several cave-ins but also hampered and slowed down the operation of his equipment.†   (source)
  • And I said, 'S-s-sebastian, do you realize that those s-sycophantic s-slugs insulted me last night, and but for the warmth of the weather might have given me a s-s-severe cold,' and he said, 'Poor things.†   (source)
  • Indeed, as at first, his manner remained seeking and not a little sycophantic at times.†   (source)
  • Our reading is mendicant and sycophantic.†   (source)
  • It would have been impossible for the sycophants of Louis XIV to flatter more dexterously.†   (source)
  • With other black boys the strife was not so fiercely sunny: their youth shrunk into tasteless sycophancy, or into silent hatred of the pale world about them and mocking distrust of everything white; or wasted itself in a bitter cry, Why did God make me an outcast and a stranger in mine own house?†   (source)
  • The thing is to have sycophants.†   (source)
  • And so his manner was that of the sycophant—although he had a better position and was earning more money than Clyde was at this time, twenty-two dollars a week, "I suppose you'll be spending a good deal of your time with your relatives and friends here," he volunteered on the occasion of their first walk together, and after he had extracted as much information as Clyde cared to impart, which was almost nothing, while he volunteered a few, most decidedly furbished bits from his own history.†   (source)
  • Yet, even in the face of that, having one type of interest and even sycophantic pride in his presence here.†   (source)
  • Short, in the meantime having gone to the rear of the store and now returning, with a most engaging and even sycophantic smile on his face, began with: "Saw you last Tuesday evening about nine o'clock going into the Finchleys' place, didn't I?†   (source)
  • Cringing and cowardly to the core by nature, Arthur Gride humbled himself in the dust before Ralph Nickleby, and, even when they had not this stake in common, would have licked his shoes and crawled upon the ground before him rather than venture to return him word for word, or retort upon him in any other spirit than one of the most slavish and abject sycophancy.†   (source)
  • Was it her fault if she did not possess those sycophantic arts which her hypocritical nephew, Pitt Crawley, practised?†   (source)
  • They know from experience that they sometimes err; and the wonder is that they so seldom err as they do, beset, as they continually are, by the wiles of parasites and sycophants; by the snares of the ambitious, the avaricious, the desperate; by the artifices of men who possess their confidence more than they deserve it, and of those who seek to possess rather than to deserve it.†   (source)
  • The little kitchen-maid on her promotion was standing at her mistress's side, quite delighted during the operation, and wagging her head up and down and crying, "Lor, Mum, 'tis bittiful"—just like a genteel sycophant in a real drawing-room.†   (source)
  • But in the vulgar sycophant who now paid court to her, Emmy always remembered the coarse tyrant who had made her miserable many a time, to whom she had been forced to put up petitions for time, when the rent was overdue; who cried out at her extravagance if she bought delicacies for her ailing mother or father; who had seen her humble and trampled upon her.†   (source)
  • But if you have, and still can shake hands with the murderers, then are you unworthy of the name of husband, father, friend, or lover, and whatever may be your rank or title in life, you have the heart of a coward, and the spirit of a sycophant.†   (source)
  • in the pound, sandwichman, distributor of throwaways, nocturnal vagrant, insinuating sycophant, maimed sailor, blind stripling, superannuated bailiffs man, marfeast, lickplate, spoilsport, pickthank, eccentric public laughingstock seated on bench of public park under discarded perforated umbrella.†   (source)
  • But the sweetness of mercy brew'd bitter destruction, and the
    frighten'd monarchs come back,
    Each comes in state with his train, hangman, priest, tax-gatherer,
    Soldier, lawyer, lord, jailer, and sycophant.†   (source)
  • They know from experience that they sometimes err; and the wonder is that they so seldom err as they do, beset, as they continually are, by the wiles of parasites and sycophants, by the snares of the ambitious, the avaricious, the desperate, by the artifices of men who possess their confidence more than they deserve it, and of those who seek to possess rather than to deserve it.†   (source)
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