Dissimulation

Use in the book

Deceptive appearance is a central target of the social satire. Burton’s Democritus rebukes people who hide deadly hatred behind a friendly face. Another passage reverses the world’s estimation of wisdom: conscientious people are treated as fools because they cannot or will not lie, dissemble, flatter or pursue advancement by crooked means. The following rebuke condemns the admired worldly opportunists, not the honest people they ridicule.

The same criticism governs friendship maintained for private ends. Without true love, friendship becomes lip service and temporary pretence, breaking into hostility when advantage changes. The age-deception anecdote gives the verb a more concrete object: a person claims to be younger. Burton’s statement extends the practice to all sides. His account of Philematium’s age differs from the supplied comparison with Lucian and should remain his reported version.

Concealment can also be recommended. In petty disputes, patience means enduring, concealing or acting as though the injury has not occurred, rather than retaliating. Under mockery, the judicious person may conceal a reaction or turn the insult aside; self-disclosure of the vulnerable point is offered as another strategy. These passages do not erase the later maxim “Lie not, dissemble not,” which accompanies keeping promises and speaking truth. Burton leaves a real difference of emphasis: outward restraint in response to injury is permitted, while deceptive conduct is prohibited in the general maxim.

The jealousy counsels extend that situational restraint. Burton first separates unfounded suspicion from a hypothetical worst case of infidelity, then recommends concealment or disregard in the latter case as a way of avoiding further self-torment. The later examples make the knowledge explicit: a wife perceives her husband’s conduct but takes no outward notice; Eumenes knows what has happened but welcomes his brother and restores his wife to favour. The advice to use kind treatment comes before the fallback of a joke or silence. These are Burton’s historical arguments about managing jealousy, not an endorsement of every silence or pretence in a present relationship.

Two further settings prevent an overly simple gloss. The emperor’s maxim that one who cannot dissemble cannot live occurs in a criticism of patrons who mistake a scrap of Latin for adequate education; it is not offered as an unqualified rule for the reader. Burton’s “dissemble with him” announces a literary pose before an anti-marriage poem, after he admits having no experience of marriage. The verb marks that distance from the borrowed voice.

Burton makes the patronage issue personal in an original margin: he could not scramble for advantage, accommodate himself to the times or dissemble, and he will not be remoulded into a flatterer even at a cost to his interests. His admission of a tincture of love uses the verb differently: after denying that he knows love, he asks why he should lie or conceal his slight experience. That deliberate wavering concerns love, while the later disclaimer concerns marriage. In another defence of his writing, he accuses anticipated critics of feigning indignation to win a grave reputation; the analogy with Petronius remains Burton’s polemical attribution of motive.

A paradoxical consolation calls fools and mad people no dissemblers, liars or hypocrites, explaining that they commonly tell the truth. The qualifier matters: Burton is contrasting inward freedom and distress with worldly estimates of happiness, not establishing an exceptionless rule about mental illness. Concealment can also precede inner accusation: in his reported story of Kenneth, false tears and solemn declarations hide a crime until conscience torments him. The supplied notes leave that story’s historical particulars unresolved.

The Latin dissimulat can mean looks away or takes no outward notice. In a marginal objection, Caecilius charges God with permitting believers’ suffering, looking away and failing to help. The speaker is the pagan objector in Minucius; Burton identifies Christian replies and later dismisses the assembled challenges. The allegation must remain an objection within the argument, rather than becoming Burton’s own assertion of divine indifference.

Related entries

Honest: Sincerity, honour and the refusal of opportunistic deception

Patience: Endurance rather than retaliation

Friendship: True friendship and the pretence of attachment

Counterfeit: False representation and assumed appearances

Temporize: Accommodation to circumstances for advantage

Ambodexter: The double-dealing person

Places to read

1. Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraphs 13–15the ironic inversion that calls honest people fools
2. Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraphs 10–12Democritus’s role as speaker in the letter narrative
3. Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraphs 18–20hatred concealed behind a friendly face among the rebuked vices
4. Subsection 15 Love of Learning or Excessive Study With a Digression on the Misery of Scholars and Why the Muses Are Melancholy · paragraphs 9–11Burton’s personal marginal refusal or inability to dissemble for patronage
5. Subsection 15 Love of Learning or Excessive Study With a Digression on the Misery of Scholars and Why the Muses Are Melancholy · paragraphs 30–32the unnamed emperor’s maxim within criticism of insufficient learning
6. Member 7 Against Rejection, Abuse, Injuries, Contempt, Disgrace, Insults, Slander, Mockery and the Like · paragraphs 30–32concealing or passing over injury as non-retaliation
7. Member 7 Against Rejection, Abuse, Injuries, Contempt, Disgrace, Insults, Slander, Mockery and the Like · paragraphs 4–6concealed reaction, deflection and pre-emptive self-disclosure
8. Member 7 Against Rejection, Abuse, Injuries, Contempt, Disgrace, Insults, Slander, Mockery and the Like · paragraphs 16–18the explicit prohibition beside promises and truthfulness
9. Member 8 Against Melancholy Itself · paragraphs 36–37no dissemblers in the paradoxical consolation, with truth-telling qualified as common
10. Section 1. Member 1. Subsection 1 The Preface · paragraphs 32–34feigned indignation attributed to critics seeking a grave reputation
11. Subsection 3 Honourable Objects of Love · paragraphs 8–10insincere friendship sustained for ulterior purposes
12. Persistence and Opportunity of Time and Place; Meetings, Conversation, Singing, Dancing, Music, Amorous Tales and Sights, Kissing, Familiarity, Tokens, Gifts, Bribes, Promises, Declarations, Tears, and So On · paragraphs 14–16misrepresented age and the limits of Burton’s Lucianic retelling
13. Member 4 Subsection 1 Symptoms or Signs of Love Melancholy in Body and Mind Good and Bad Signs and So Forth · paragraphs 25–27denial of love followed by admission and a refusal to conceal it
14. By Counsel and Persuasion, the Foulness of the Deed, the Faults of Men and Women, the Miseries of Marriage, the Consequences of Lust, and So Forth · paragraphs 16–18an avowed poetic pose rather than an unqualified personal declaration
15. The Cure of Jealousy: Avoiding Occasions for It, Keeping Occupied; Good Counsel; Disregarding It, Not Watching Women or Locking Them Up; Concealing It, and So On · paragraphs 24–26jealousy, unfounded suspicion and the conditional counsel to conceal
16. The Cure of Jealousy: Avoiding Occasions for It, Keeping Occupied; Good Counsel; Disregarding It, Not Watching Women or Locking Them Up; Concealing It, and So On · paragraphs 20–24conscious non-notice, kind treatment, jokes, silence and Eumenes’s concealed knowledge
17. Member 2 Subsection 1 Religious Melancholy From Deficiency: Those Affected—Epicures, Atheists, Hypocrites, the Worldly and Complacent, Carnalists, All Impious People, Impenitent Sinners, and Others · paragraphs 3–12Caecilius’s allegation of divine disregard, Christian answers and Burton’s rejection of the objections
18. Causes of Despair: The Devil, Melancholy, Meditation, Distrust, Weakness of Faith, Harsh Ministers, Misunderstanding Scripture, Guilty Consciences, and So On · paragraphs 1–3concealed crime followed by conscience in the historically qualified Kenneth narrative

In this edition

“dissimulation” becomes “deceit” when hatred is hidden behind friendliness. The injunction “Lie not, dissemble not” becomes “Do not lie or dissemble.” By contrast, dissemble in the response to mockery becomes “conceal their feelings”: feelings explains the original’s implicit object. In the injury passage, “dissemble it” is expanded to “act as though it has not occurred,” with the injury as antecedent.

“dissembling the matter” becomes “he concealed his knowledge,” drawing knowledge from the immediately preceding statement that Eumenes knew all the particulars. Rem dissimulavit becomes pretended not to notice, while “dissemble with him” becomes “pretend along with the poet.” These renderings distinguish deceptive purpose, controlled reaction and openly announced performance.

“Dissemblers” remains “dissemblers,” with “commonly” rendered “generally” in the explanation about truth-telling. In Burton’s admission of love, “dissemble” becomes “conceal it,” with the object drawn from his admitted tincture or touch of love. In Caecilius’s original marginal objection, “dissimulat” becomes “looks away”; its subject and allegation belong to that hostile speaker. “Dissembled the matter” becomes “concealed the matter” in the crime narrative, whose false tears and solemn declarations remain the means of concealment.

dissemble

Printed “dissemble” (English; lemma).

To conceal an experience or feeling.

Here: Burton asks why he should conceal having a slight experience of love.

Context: His admission immediately qualifies the preceding denial of love; it remains distinct from his later claim to lack experience of marriage and his openly borrowed poetic pose.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: for why should I lye, dissemble or excuse it

Modern rendering: for why should I lie, conceal it or make excuses?

Word and construction: Dissemble becomes conceal it, with the object it supplied from his admitted tincture of love; the question rejects concealment.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

dissemble an injury

Printed “dissemble it” (English; phrase).

To conceal an injury or act as though it had not occurred.

Here: Restraint prevents retaliation and further quarrelling.

Context: Burton recommends patience in petty disputes, forgiveness when the offender repents, and peace as far as possible.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: to put up, conceal, or dissemble it

Modern rendering: endure the injury, conceal it or act as though it has not occurred

Word and construction: The expanded English makes injury the antecedent of it; dissemble is the third alternative, acting as though it has not occurred.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “dissemble” (English; lemma).

Citation key: dissemble a reaction.

Here: The judicious person does not display resentment when mocked.

Context: Burton offers restraint among several responses to insult; the actual feeling is implicit in the original.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: dissemble, or wisely turn it off

Modern rendering: conceal their feelings or wisely turn it aside

Word and construction: Feelings is supplied to explain the omitted object of dissemble; wisely belongs to turning the offence aside.

Sense relation: Concealment of the response to injury continues the non-retaliatory purpose.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “dissemble” (English; lemma).

Citation key: dissemble.

Here: Burton proposes restraint within an argument against jealous self-torment.

Context: He distinguishes unfounded suspicion from a hypothetical worst case of infidelity, then advises concealment only in such a case; these are historical relationship counsels.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: How much better were it in such a case to dissemble or contemn it?

Modern rendering: How much better, in such a case, to conceal or disregard it!

Word and construction: Dissemble supplies conceal, contemn disregard; in such a case retains the limitation.

Sense relation: The same outward restraint is applied to jealousy, with the stated hypothetical condition.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “dissembling the matter” (English; lemma).

Citation key: dissemble.

Here: Eumenes welcomes his brother and wife despite knowing the reported succession and marriage.

Context: Burton’s historical anecdote expressly says Eumenes knew the particulars; dissembling does not imply ignorance or disbelief.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: dissembling the matter

Modern rendering: he concealed his knowledge

Alignment scope: phrase with he, his and knowledge supplied from preceding context; though/yet concession belongs to the wider sentence

Word and construction: He, his and knowledge are supplied from the preceding Eumenes though he knew all particulars passed; the surrounding though/yet concession is retained by Though in the wider modern sentence.

Sense relation: Restraint takes the specific form of concealing knowledge rather than pretending the event was never known.

dissemble with

Printed “dissemble with him” (English; phrase).

To pretend or adopt a pose along with another speaker.

Here: Burton announces a borrowed poetic posture against marriage after admitting his lack of marital experience.

Context: The ensuing poem’s rejection of marriage is introduced as pretence, not a straightforward autobiographical profession.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: For my part I’le dissemble with him

Modern rendering: For my part, I will pretend along with the poet

Word and construction: With him is rendered along with the poet, whose verse immediately follows.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

dissembler

Printed “dissemblers” (English; lemma).

People who conceal their real disposition or practise deceptive pretence.

Here: Burton denies such deceit to those called fools or mad, while saying they commonly tell the truth.

Context: This is a deliberately paradoxical consolation, contrasting inner peace and suffering with worldly estimates of good fortune; commonly must not become invariably.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: They are no dissemblers, lyers, hypocrites, for fools and mad men tell commonly truth.

Modern rendering: They are no dissemblers, liars or hypocrites, for fools and mad people generally tell the truth.

Word and construction: Dissemblers is retained; no preserves the denial and commonly becomes generally, qualifying the supporting claim about truth.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

dissimulation

Printed “dissimulation” (English; lemma).

Deceptive concealment of one’s actual disposition or purpose.

Here: Deadly hatred is hidden beneath a friendly appearance.

Context: Democritus rebukes human vices in Burton’s retelling of the pseudonymous Hippocratic letter tradition.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: your dissimulation and hypocrisie, bearing deadly hatred one to the other, and yet shadowing it with a good face

Modern rendering: your deceit and hypocrisy: you bear one another deadly hatred, yet conceal it behind a friendly face

Word and construction: Dissimulation is rendered deceit; the following construction identifies the concealed hatred and friendly exterior.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “dissemble” (English; lemma).

Citation key: dissimulate.

Here: Conscientious people are called foolish because they will not practise opportunistic deception.

Context: Burton satirizes society’s judgment; the next paragraph calls the admired worldly people foolish, not the conscientious victims.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: cannot, or will not ly and dissemble

Modern rendering: cannot or will not lie, dissemble

Word and construction: The two verbs remain distinct but coordinated; cannot or will not preserves inability and refusal.

Sense relation: The same deceptive conduct is refused, and the social praise of it is ironic.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “dissembled” (English; lemma).

Citation key: dissimulate.

Here: Insincere friendship lasts only until the participants’ private purposes have been served.

Context: Burton conditions the claim on the absence of true love and contrasts outward friendship with subsequent enmity.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: friendship from teeth outward, counterfeit, or for some by respects, so long dissembled, till they have satisfied their own ends

Modern rendering: friendship is mere lip service, a pretence serving some ulterior motive, kept up only until people have satisfied their own ends

Word and construction: Dissembled contributes the sustained pretence; the other phrases supply outwardness and ulterior motives.

Sense relation: The concealed intention makes friendship a temporary performance.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “dissemble” (English; lemma).

Citation key: dissimulate.

Here: People misstate their age in the reported courtship example.

Context: Burton reports a Lucianic story with ages differing from the comparison text; he says this deception is common on all sides, not only among women.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: But to dissemble in this kind, is familiar of all sides, and often it takes.

Modern rendering: But such deception is common on all sides, and often succeeds.

Word and construction: The infinitive dissemble is recast as deception; in this kind refers to the age claim just described.

Sense relation: The same family includes overt misrepresentation of age, not concealment alone.

Uncertainty: The supplied note gives Lucian’s claim as twenty-two; Burton has thirty-two next December. His actual-age figure is forty-five.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “dissemble” (English; lemma).

Citation key: dissimulate.

Here: The maxim forbids deceit beside lying and enjoins truth and keeping promises.

Context: Burton includes an imperative prohibition in his collection of maxims; it must not be silently deleted in favour of his situational advice to conceal reactions.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: Lie not, dissemble not.

Modern rendering: Do not lie or dissemble.

Word and construction: The modern coordination preserves the prohibition applying to both verbs.

Sense relation: The ordinary deceptive sense is explicitly condemned here.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “dissemble” (English; lemma).

Citation key: dissemble.

Here: Burton says that he could not dissemble to secure patronage.

Context: His personal original margin joins inability to scramble for advantage with unwillingness to be remoulded into a flatterer, however much his interests suffer.

Source: original marginal quotation

Source wording and original alignment: I could not scamble, temporize, dissemble

Modern rendering: I could not scramble for advantage, suit myself to the times or dissemble

Word and construction: Dissemble is retained; could not governs all three coordinated activities, while the subsequent Latin adds explicit unwillingness to be remoulded.

Modern container: note

Sense relation: The same deceptive opportunism is personally refused or disclaimed by Burton.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “dissembling” (English; lemma).

Citation key: dissemble.

Here: The imagined critics feign moral indignation to acquire a reputation for gravity.

Context: Burton accuses them by analogy with Eumolpus in Petronius; this is his characterization of critics, not an independently established motive.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: dissembling with him in Petronius, and seem to be angry that their ears are violated with such obscene speeches

Modern rendering: Like the character in Petronius, they pretend to be angry that such obscene talk offends their ears

Word and construction: Dissembling and seem jointly contribute pretend; the modern wording reorganizes the comparison but preserves the feigned anger and its object.

Sense relation: The deceptive outward display here is indignation intended to secure a grave reputation.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “dissembled the matter” (English; lemma).

Citation key: dissemble.

Here: The reported murderer hides the crime with false tears and declarations before conscience accuses him.

Context: The narrative is Burton’s transmitted account of Kenneth; its names, kinship and historical sequence remain unverified in the supplied notes.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: with counterfeit tears and protestations dissembled the matter a long time

Modern rendering: concealed the matter for a long time with false tears and solemn declarations

Word and construction: Dissembled supplies concealed; counterfeit tears and protestations are the deceptive means, and the long duration remains.

Sense relation: The same deceptive concealment is explicitly a means of hiding a crime, followed by inner accusation.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

dissimulo · dissimulare

Printed “dissimulare” (Latin; lemma).

To dissemble, conceal or disguise.

Here: A cynical maxim substitutes practical cunning for substantial learning in the portrait of inadequate patrons.

Context: Burton attributes the maxim to an unnamed emperor; the surrounding argument criticizes people who think this scrap of Latin sufficient qualification.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: qui nescit dissimulare, nescit vivere

Modern rendering: He who does not know how to dissemble does not know how to live

Word and construction: Dissimulare is to dissemble; the two nescit clauses express the maxim’s parallel claims, not Burton’s unqualified instruction.

Uncertainty: The emperor’s identity is unresolved in the supplied edition.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

dissimulo · dissimulat

Printed “dissimulat” (Latin; lemma).

He looks away or takes no outward notice.

Here: The verb describes the alleged divine disregard of the suffering of believers.

Context: Caecilius, the pagan objector in Minucius, makes this accusation; Burton names Christian answers and later dismisses the assembled objections. It is not Burton’s own assertion about God.

Source: original marginal quotation

Source wording and original alignment: deus patitur, dissimulat, non vult, non potest opitulari suis

Modern rendering: God permits it, looks away, is unwilling or unable to help his own

Word and construction: Dissimulat supplies looks away; it in God permits it is supplied from the preceding account of suffering in the wider margin. The surrounding verbs preserve the objection’s separate claims of permission, unwillingness and inability, with the modern or joining the latter alternatives.

Modern container: note

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

rem dissimulare

Printed “rem dissimulavit” (Latin; phrase).

Rem means the matter; dissimulavit means concealed or pretended not to notice it.

Here: The wife perceives her husband’s conduct yet treats the maid kindly and takes no outward notice.

Context: This is Burton’s reported anecdote; the supplied note corrects his confused naming of Tertia Aemilia and her relationship.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: rem dissimulavit

Modern rendering: pretended not to notice

Word and construction: The English supplies the idiomatic outward response; rem is the affair already perceived, not an assertion that the woman is unaware.

Qualification: Burton prints Tertius Æmilius wife; the supplied editorial note identifies Tertia Aemilia, wife of Scipio Africanus and mother of Cornelia.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.