blandishing

English

Adjective

blandishing (comparative more blandishing, superlative most blandishing)

1. Tending to charm and flatter; smooth and flattering, especially when disingenuous.
   • 1844, Emma Robinson, Whitefriars, page 6:

     There was one Rumsey, a creature of Shaftesbury's, a man of very blandishing manners, with a sly, foxy expression of countenance, likely to put a physiognomist on his guard.

   • 1869, Jenny's Geranium, Or, The Prize Flower of a London Court, page 28:

     Mrs. Spivens could be very blandishing and fascinating when people had money to spend; but a poor girl wanting father—there was something too prosaic in that common every-day occurrence to rouse even into momentary compassion the pinions of Mrs. Spiven's lofty soul.

   • 2015, Lucia McMahon, Deborah Schriver, To Read My Heart: The Journal of Rachel Van Dyke, page 353:

     There unquestionably are times in the life of every one, when either through a dislike of contemplating gloomy realities, or from an unwillingness to rack the mind by the investigation of abstract truth, or mazy science, a disposition is felt for resigning one's self to the enjoyment of those more blandishing scenes which the rainbow pencil of fancy is ever ready to paint.

Derived terms

• blandishingly

 

Verb

blandishing

1. present participle and gerund of blandish