The book states this saying twice, word for word: here and at 14:12.
Quick answer
A road can feel right the whole way down. Sincerity is not a compass, and Proverbs thought the warning important enough to print twice without changing a word.
Read both lines
The deception gets its full power: the way seems right not to a fool or a villain but "to a man," anyone, you. Nothing about the road announces its destination; the scenery is plausible, the incline gentle. The whole warning hangs on the word end: the road's character is revealed by where it terminates, not how it feels underfoot, and feelings were never designed to detect destinations. The sages doubled this saying (14:12) the way a builder doubles a beam under the heaviest load. If seeming right proves nothing, the traveler needs a word from beyond the road, which is what this whole book offers.
What it does not mean
The verse is not a weapon for dismissing everyone whose convictions differ from yours, as though their sincerity proved their doom while yours proved nothing. It removes one specific comfort, the inner sense of rightness as evidence of safety, from everybody evenly, and the response it seeks is humility about self: test the road you are on against the word, because your dashboard cannot warn you.
Related: Proverbs 14:12 · Proverbs 3:5–6 · Matthew 7:13–14
New King James Version®, Copyright © 1982, Thomas Nelson. All rights reserved. Full copyright information. Scripture provided by API.Bible.
Go Deeper
If this verse has been used to put weight on you that it was never carrying, ask about it directly.