As let a man sticke a Candle to a stone wall, though the Candle do not burne through it, yet it will leaue a shrewd smutch behind it, soyling the wall, so as it will not easily be wyped out. Thus it is with tentations, though they doe not all the mischiefe they would and might doe, they will yet be sure to leaue an impression of filth and staines behinde them.

I could favour you with sundry touches
Of the paint-smutches with which the Duchess

Looking out of her window, she was alerted by a smutch of bronze light glowering on this Anglo-Flemish landscape.

Have you seene but a bright Lilly grow,
Before rude hands have touch’d it?
Have you mark’d but the fall of Snow,

And then in came a wee girl of seven, with dirty face and pure blue eyes and a smutched and insufficient dress.

Receive them all—and should you choose to touch them
With one slant ray of quick, American light,
Even the dust will have no power to smutch them,
Even the worst will glitter in the night.

Smutch

Meaning

Verb

Noun