Sample Sentences for

discreet

grouped by contextual meaning

(editor-reviewed)

I will be discreet in my investigation.

We are discreet at the office. We never display affection or act as though we date.

You can count on her to be discreet.

...never take a check from a Delafield without a discreet call to the bank;  (source) Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird, 1960

Then, as discreetly as I could, I said, "What's the matter with you, boy, not liking Mr. Morrison?"  (source) Mildred D. Taylor, Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry, 1976

Questions are never indiscreet. Answers sometimes are.  (source) Oscar Wilde, An Ideal Husband, 1905

But she was still young and incapable of hiding her feelings; and by inviting her papa and sister to her third-rate parties, and behaving very coldly to them when they came, and by avoiding Russell Square, and indiscreetly begging her father to quit that odious vulgar place, she did more harm than all Frederick's diplomacy could repair, and perilled her chance of her inheritance like a giddy heedless creature as she was.†  (source) William Makepeace Thackeray, Vanity Fair, 1848

But what I want of the contrast of broadcast or exposing versus discreet light is to suggest what the claims are, or the illusions, the discreeter seems to allow.†  (source) Saul Bellow, The Adventures of Augie March, 1949

In outward also her resembling less His image who made both, and less expressing The character of that dominion given O'er other creatures: Yet when I approach Her loveliness, so absolute she seems And in herself complete, so well to know Her own, that what she wills to do or say, Seems wisest, virtuousest, discreetest, best: All higher knowledge in her presence falls Degraded;†  (source) John Milton, Paradise Lost, 1667

"O stormy people, unsad* and ev'r untrue, *variable And undiscreet, and changing as a vane, Delighting ev'r in rumour that is new, For like the moon so waxe ye and wane: Aye full of clapping, *dear enough a jane,* *worth nothing <12>* Your doom* is false, your constance evil preveth,** *judgment **proveth A full great fool is he that you believeth."†  (source) Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales, 1350

I'm surprised at the indiscreetness you commit.†  (source) Charles Dickens, Bleak House, 1853

In a confidential tone, he added, "We need some discreet assistance here."  (source) Carl Hiassen, Hoot, 2002

She tilted her chin so that one plume swept gracefully against her cheek, discreetly curled and uncurled her numb toes inside the kid slippers, and set herself to endure.  (source) Elizabeth George Speare, The Witch of Blackbird Pond, 1958

I need someone who is discreet--not someone as clueless and foolish as her little brother.

Mr. Raymond chuckled, not at all offended, and I tried to frame a discreet question: "Why do you do like you do?"  (source) Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird, 1960

Do you want to be told that you are only unlike other people in being more wise and discreet?  (source) Jane Austen, Mansfield Park, 1814

He enfolded his Della. For ten seconds let us regard with discreet scrutiny some inconsequential object in the other direction.  (source) O. Henry, The Gift of the Magi, 1905

As though animated by a common impulse, the onlookers drew back to a respectful distance; nor were they again indiscreet enough to interrupt.  (source) Jack London, The Call of the Wild, 1903

But honestly and slyly* he it spent, *discreetly, prudently That no man wonder'd how that he it had.  (source) Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales, 1350

I consider the blessing of a wife as most justly described in those discreet lines of the poet—'Heaven's last best gift.'  (source) Jane Austen, Mansfield Park, 1814

It would have been indiscreet and unprofessional for us to become sexual partners.  (source) J. D. Robb, Naked in Death, 1995

For he from vices would him aye chastise Discreetly, as by word, and not by deed; "Sir," he would say, "an emperor must need Be virtuous, and hate tyranny."  (source) Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales, 1350

Discreet he was, and of great reverence: He seemed such, his wordes were so wise,  (source) Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales, 1350

Well, I have been indiscreet, formerly; but I think I have got over it.  (source) Henry James, Washington Square, 1880

This prayer must be truly said, and in very faith, and that men pray to God ordinately, discreetly, and devoutly; and always a man shall put his will to be subject to the will of God.  (source) Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales, 1350

A madness most discreet,  (source) William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, 1599