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Definition of "wheedle" []

  • To persuade or attempt to persuade by flattery or guile; cajole. (verb-transitive)
  • To obtain through the use of flattery or guile: a swindler who wheedled my life savings out of me. (verb-transitive)
  • To use flattery or cajolery to achieve one's ends. (verb-intransitive)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Use "wheedle" in a sentence
  • "Ms. LENHART: We heard from teens who said, you know, when I want the yes, I'll go to the phone because my parents can hear my voice and I can kind of wheedle and I can charm them, and that's how I'm going to get what I want."
  • "She will connive and she will lie and she will wheedle her way in as far as she can wheedle, further than you can imagine, until — — oh, I don't know — — she has the password to your SL account."
  • "He, who was sheer bladed steel in the imperious flashing of his will, could swashbuckle and bully like any over-seas roisterer, or wheedle as wickedly winningly as the first woman out of Eden or the last woman of that descent."