honey-mouthed

Adjective

honey-mouthed (comparative more honey-mouthed, superlative most honey-mouthed)

1. (idiomatic) (in a positive sense) Having a sweet and smooth voice; eloquent.
   • Truely, when I reade a Sermon of Chrysostome, or of Chrysologus, or of Ambrose, Men, who carry in the very signification of their Names, and in their Histories, the attributes of Hony mouthed, and Golden-mouthed Men, I finde my selfe oftentimes, more affected, with the very Citation, and...1627, John Donne, Fifty Sermons, London: M.F., J. Marriot & R. Royston, 1649, Volume 2, Sermon 42, p. 386
   • […] they had much profitable conversation, McCampbell quoting the doctrines of a rabbi called John Calvin, and our grandfather’s grandfather replying with Talmud and Torah till McCampbell would almost weep that such a honey-mouthed scholar should be destined to eternal damnation.1938, Stephen Vincent Benét, “Jacob and the Indians”, in Selected Works of Stephen Vincent Benét, volume 2, New York: Farrar & Rinehart, published 1942, page 10
2. (idiomatic) (in a negative sense) Indirect, delivering a message in a way that will make it seem more pleasant to the hearer(s); seductive, persuasive.
   • Now to thintent thou mayest playnly beholde and Iudge rightly of these hony mouthed false feynyng flatterours and auncient enemyes of Christes religion the better and more readily […]1553, Stephen Gardiner, “The Preface of the translatour to the gentil reader”, in Edmund Bonner, transl., Touching True Obedience, Rome: Hugh Singleton
   • He must be told on’t, and he shall: the office
     Becomes a woman best; I’ll take’t upon me:
     If I prove honey-mouth’d let my tongue blister
     And never to my red-look’d anger be
     The trumpet any more.c. 1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Winters Tale”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount...