[Footnote 1: Several of the illustrations of Oriental warfare in the Bible record are to be explained in accordance with this principle. Thus with the ambush set by Joshua before Ai (Josh. 8: 1-26): the Canaanites did not read aright the riddle of the Israelitish commander, and they suffered accordingly. Yet Dr. Dabney (Theology, p. 424) cites this as an instance of an intentional deception which was innocent in God's sight. And again, in the case recorded at 2 Kings 7: 6, where the Lord "made the host of the Syrians to hear a noise of chariots, and a noise of horses, even the noise of a great host,… and they arose and … fled for their life," thinking that Hittite and Egyptian forces were approaching, it is evident that God simply caused the Syrians, who were contending with his people, to feel that they were fighting hopelessly against God's cause. The impression God made on their minds was a correct one. He could bring chariots and horses as a great host against them. They did well to realize this fact. But the Syrians' explanation of this impression was incorrect in its details.]
A similar method of mystifying his opponent is adopted by the base-ball pitcher in his demonstrations with the ball before letting it drive at the batsman. The batsman holds himself responsible for reading the riddle of the pitcher's motions. Yet the pitcher is forbidden to deceive the batsman by a feint of delivering the ball without delivering it.
If an enemy attempts any communication with his opponent, he has no right to lie to, or to deceive him. He must not draw him into an ambuscade, or over concealed torpedoes, on the plea of desiring an amicable interview with him; and his every word given to an enemy must be observed sacredly as an obligation of truth.
Even before the Christian era, and centuries prior to the time when Chrysostom was confused in his mind on this point, Cicero wrote as to the obligations of veracity upon enemies in time of war, and in repudiation of the idea that warfare included a suspension of all moral relations between belligerents during active hostilities.[1]
[Footnote 1: Cicero's De Officiis, I., 12, 13.]
He said: "The equities of war are prescribed most carefully by the heralds' law (lex fetialis) of the Roman people," and he went on to give illustrations of the recognized duty of combatants to keep within the bounds of mutual social obligations. "Even where private persons, under stress of circumstances, have made any promise to the enemy," he said, "they should observe the exactest good faith, as did Regulus, in the first Punic war, when taken prisoner and sent to Rome to treat of the exchange of prisoners, having sworn that he would return. First, when he had arrived, he did not vote in the Senate for the return of the prisoners. Then, when his friends and kinsmen would have detained him, he preferred to go back to punishment rather than evade his faith plighted to the enemy.
"In the second Punic war also, after the battle of Cannae, of the ten Romans whom Hannibal sent to Rome bound by an oath that they would return unless they obtained an agreement for the redemption of prisoners, the censors kept disfranchised those who perjured themselves, making no exception in favor of him who had devised a fraudulent evasion of his oath. For when by leave of Hannibal he had departed from the camp, he went back a little later, on pretense of having forgotten something. Then departing again from the camp [without renewing his oath], he counted himself set free from the obligation of his oath. And so he was free so far as the words went, but not so in reality; for always in a promise we must have regard to the meaning of our words, rather than to the words themselves."
In modern times, when Lord Clive, in India, acted on the theory that an utter lack of veracity and good faith on the part of an enemy justified a suspension of all moral obligations toward him, and practiced deceit on a Bengalee by the name of Omichund, in order to gain an advantage over the Nabob of Bengal, he was condemned by the moral sense of the nation for which he thus acted deceitfully; and, in spite of the specious arguments put forth by his partisan defenders, his name is infamous because of this transaction.
"English valor and English intelligence have done less to extend and preserve our Oriental empire than English veracity," says Lord Macaulay. "All that we could have gained by imitating the doublings, the evasions, the fictions, the perjuries, which have been employed against us, is as nothing when compared with what we have gained by being the one power in India on whose word reliance can be placed. No oath which superstition can devise, no hostage however precious, inspires a hundredth part of the confidence which is produced by the 'yea, yea,' and the 'nay, nay,' of a British envoy." Therefore it is that Lord Macaulay is sure that "looking at the question of expediency in the lowest sense of the word, and using no arguments but such as Machiavelli might have employed in his conferences with Borgia, we are convinced that Clive was altogether in the wrong, and that he committed, not merely a crime but a blunder."[1]
[Footnote 1: Macaulay's Essay on Lord Clive.]
So again when an English vessel of war made signals of distress, off the coast of France, during the war with Napoleon, and thereby deceived men from the enemy into coming to its relief, and then held them as prisoners, the act was condemned by the moral sense of the world. As Woolsey says, in his "International Law:"[1] "Breach of faith between enemies has always been strongly condemned, and that vindication of it is worthless which maintains that, without an express or tacit promise to our enemy, we are not bound to keep faith with him."
[Footnote 1: Sect. 133, p. 213.]
The theologian who assumes that the duty of veracity is suspended between enemies in war time is ignorant of the very theory of civilized warfare; or else he fails to distinguish between justifiable concealment, by the aid of methods of mystifying, and falsehood which is never justifiable. And that commander who should attempt to justify falsehood and bad faith in warfare on the ground that it is held justifiable in certain works on Christian ethics, would incur the scorn of the civilized world for his credulity; and he would be told that it is absurd to claim that because he is entitled to kill a man in warfare it must be fair to lie to him.
In the treatment of the medical profession, many writers on ethics have been as unfair, as in their misrepresentation of the general moral sense with reference to warfare. They have spoken as if "the ethics of the medical profession" had a recognized place for falsehood in the treatment of the sick. But this assumption is only an assumption. There are physicians who will lie, and there are physicians who will not lie; and in each case the individual physician acts in this matter on his own responsibility: he has no code of professional ethics justifying a lie on his part as a physician, when it would not be justifiable in a layman.
Concealment of that which he has a right to conceal, is as clearly a duty, in many a case, on the part of a physician, as it is on the part of any other person; but falsehood is never a legitimate, or an allowable, means of concealment by physician or layman. As has been already stated[1] if it be once known that a physician is ever ready to speak words of cheer to a patient falsely, that physician is measurably deprived of the possibility of encouraging a patient by truthful words of cheer when he would gladly do so. And physicians would probably be surprised to know how generally they are estimated in the community according to their reputation in this matter. One is known as a man who will speak falsely to his patients as a means of encouragement, while another is known as a man who will be cautious about giving his opinion concerning chances of recovery, but who will never tell an untruth to a patient or to any other person. But in no case can a physician claim that the ethics of his profession as a profession justify him in a falsehood to any person—patient or no patient.
[Footnote 1: See p. 75 f., supra.]
A distinguished professor in one of the prominent medical colleges of this country, in denying the claim of a writer on ethics that it may become the duty of a physician to deceive his patient as a means of curing him, declares that a physician acting on this theory "will not be found in accord with the best and the highest medical teaching of the present day;" and he goes on to say:[1] "In my profession to-day, the truth properly presented, we have found, carries with it a convincing and adjusting element which does not fail to bring the afflicted person to that condition of mind that is most conducive to his physical well-being, and let me add also, I believe, to his spiritual welfare." This statement was made in connection with the declaration that in the hospital which was in his charge it is not deemed right or wise to deceive a patient as to any operation to be performed upon him. And there are other well-known physicians who testify similarly as to the ethics of their profession.
[Footnote 1: In a personal communication to the author.]
An illustration of the possible good results of concealing an unpleasant fact from a sick person, that has been a favorite citation all along the centuries with writers on ethics who would justify emergency falsehoods, is one which is given in his correspondence by Pliny the younger, eighteen centuries ago.[1]
[Footnote 1: Epistles of Pliny the Younger, Book III., Epis. 16.
Pliny to Nepos.]
Caecinna Paetus and his son "were both at the same time attacked with what seemed a mortal illness, of which the son died…. His mother [Arria] managed his funeral so privately that Paetus did not know of his death. Whenever she came into his bedchamber, she pretended that her son was better, and, as often as he inquired after his health, would answer that he had rested well, or had eaten with an appetite. When she found she could no longer restrain her grief, but her tears were gushing out, she would leave the room, and, having given vent to her passion, return again with dry eyes and a serene countenance, as if she had dismissed every sentiment of sorrow."
This Roman matron also committed suicide, as an encouragement to her husband whom she desired to have put an end to his own life, when he was likely to have it taken from him by the executioner; and Pliny commends her nobleness of conduct in both cases. It is common among ethical writers, in citing this instance in favor of lying, to say nothing about the suicide, and to omit mention of the fact that the mother squarely lied, by saying that her dead boy had eaten a good breakfast, instead of employing language that might have been the truth as far as it went, while it concealed that portion of the truth which she thought it best to conceal. It is common to quote her as simply saying of her son" He is better;"[1] quite a different version from Pliny's, and presenting a different issue.
[Footnote 1: See Newman Smyth's Christian Ethics, p. 395, where this case is stated with vagueness of phrase, and as thus stated is approved.]
It was perfectly proper for that mother to conceal the signs of her sorrow from her sick husband, who had no right to know the truth concerning matters outside of his sick-room at such a time. And if, indeed, she could say in all sincerity, as expressive of her feelings in the death of her son, by the will of the gods, "He is better," it would have been possible for her to feel that she was entitled to say that as the truth, and not as a falsehood; and in that case she would not have intended a deceit, but only a concealment. But when, on the other hand, she told a deliberate lie—spoke falsely in order to deceive—she committed a sin in so doing, and her sin was none the less a sin because it resulted in apparent good to her husband. An illustration does not overturn a principle, but it may misrepresent it.
Another illustration, on the other side of the case, is worth citing here. Victor Hugo pictures, in his Les Miserables,[1] a sister of charity adroitly concealing facts from a sick person in a hospital, while refusing to tell a falsehood even for the patient's good. "Never to have told a falsehood, never to have said for any advantage, or even indifferently, a thing which was not the truth, the holy truth, was the characteristic feature of Sister Simplice." She had taken the name of Simplice through special choice. "Simplice, of Sicily, our readers will remember, is the saint who sooner let her bosom be plucked out than say she was a native of Segeste, as she was born at Syracuse, though the falsehood would have saved her. Such a patron saint suited this soul." And in speaking of Sister Simplice, as never having told even "a white lie," Victor Hugo quotes a letter from the Abbé Sicard, to his deaf-mute pupil Massieu, on this point: "Can there be such a thing as a white lie, an innocent lie? Lying is the absolute of evil. Lying a little is not possible. The man who lies tells the whole lie. Lying is the face of the fiend; and Satan has two names,—he is called Satan and Lying." Victor Hugo the romancer would seem to be a safer guide, so far, for the physician or the nurse in the sick-room, than Pliny the rhetorician, or Rothe the theologian.[2]
[Footnote 1: Book VII.]
[Footnote 2: Yet Victor Hugo afterwards represents even Sister Simplice as lying unqualifiedly, when sorely tempted—although not in the sick-room.]
A well-known physician, in speaking to me of this subject, said: "It is not so difficult to avoid falsehood in dealing with anxious patients as many seem to suppose. Tact, as well as principle, will do a good deal to help a physician out, in an emergency. I have never seen any need of lying, in my practice." And yet another physician, who had been in a widely varied practice for forty years, said that he had never found it necessary to tell a lie to a patient; although he thought he might have done so if he had deemed it necessary to save a patient's life. In other words, while he admitted the possible justification of an "emergency lie," he had never found a first-class opening for one in his practice. And he added, that he knew very well that if he had been known to lie to his patients, his professional efficiency, as well as his good name, would have suffered. Medical men do not always see, in their practice, the supposed advantages of lying, which have so large prominence in the minds of ethical writers.
Another profession, which is popularly and wrongly accused of having a place for the lie in its system of ethics, is the legal profession. Whewell refers to this charge in his "Elements of Morality" (citing Paley in its support). He says: "Some moralists have ranked with the cases in which convention supersedes the general rule of truth, an advocate asserting the justice, or his belief in the justice, of his client's cause." But as to an advocate's right in this matter, Whewell says explicitly: "If, in pleading, he assert his belief that his cause is just, when he believes it unjust, he offends against truth; as any other man would do who, in like manner, made a like assertion."[1]
[Footnote 1: Whewell's Elements of Morality, § 400.]
Chief-Justice Sharswood, of Pennsylvania, in his standard work on "Legal Ethics," cites this opinion of Whewell with unqualified approval; and, in speaking for the legal profession, he says: "No counsel can with propriety and good conscience express to court or jury his belief in the justice of his client's cause, contrary to the fact. Indeed, the occasions are very rare in which he ought to throw the weight of his private opinion into the scales in favor of the side he has espoused." Calling attention to the fact that the official oath of an attorney, on his admission to the bar, in the state of Pennsylvania, includes the specific promise to "use no falsehood," he says: "Truth in all its simplicity—truth to the court, client, and adversary—should be indeed the polar star of the lawyer. The influence of only slight deviations from truth upon professional character is very observable. A man may as well be detected in a great as a little lie. A single discovery, among professional brethren, of a failure of truthfulness, makes a man the object of distrust, subjects him to constant mortification, and soon this want of confidence extends itself beyond the Bar to those who employ the Bar. That lawyer's case is truly pitiable, upon the escutcheon of whose honesty or truth rests the slightest tarnish."[1]
[Footnote 1: Sharswood's Essay on Professional Ethics, pp. 57, 99,102,167 f.]
As illustrative of the carelessness with which popular charges against an entire profession are made the basis of reflections upon the ethical standard of that profession, the comments of Dr. Hodge on this matter are worthy of particular notice. In connection with his assertion that "the principles of professional men allow of many things which are clearly inconsistent with the requirements of the ninth commandment," he says: "Lord Brougham is reported to have said, in the House of Lords, that an advocate knows no one but his client. He is bound per fas et nefas, if possible, to clear him. If necessary for the accomplishment of that object, he is at liberty to accuse and defame the innocent, and even (as the report stated) to ruin his country. It is not unusual, especially in trials for murder, for the advocates of the accused to charge the crime on innocent parties and to exert all their ingenuity to convince the jury of their guilt." And Dr. Hodge adds the note that "Lord Brougham, according to the public papers, uttered these sentiments in vindication of the conduct of the famous Irish advocate Phillips, who on the trial of Courvoisier for the murder of Lord Russell, endeavored to fasten the guilt on the butler and housemaid, whom he knew to be innocent, as his client had confessed to him that he had committed the murder."[1]
[Footnote 1: Hodge's Systematic Theology, III., 439.]
Now the facts, in the two very different cases thus erroneously intermingled by Dr. Hodge, as given by Justice Sharswood,[1] present quite another aspect from that in which Dr. Hodge sees them, as bearing on the accepted ethics of the legal profession. It would appear that Lord Brougham was not speaking in defense of another attorney's action, but in defense of his own course as attorney of Queen Caroline, thirty years before the Courvoisier murder trial. As Justice Sharswood remarks of Lord Brougham's "extravagant" claims: "No doubt he was led by the excitement of so great an occasion to say what cool reflection and sober reason certainly never can approve." Yet Lord Brougham does not appear to have suggested, in his claim, that a lawyer had a right to falsify the facts involved, or to utter an untruth. He was speaking of his supposed duty to defend his client, the Queen, against the charges of the King, regardless of the consequences to himself or to his country through his advocacy of her cause, which he deemed a just one.
[Footnote 1: Sharswood's Legal Ethics, p. 86 f.]
And as to the charge against the eminent advocate, Charles Phillips, of seeking to fasten the crime on the innocent, when he knew that his client was guilty, in the trial of Courvoisier for the murder of Lord Russell, that charge was overwhelmingly refuted by the testimony of lawyers and judges present at that trial. Mr. Phillips supposed his client an innocent man until the trial was nearly concluded. Then came the unexpected confession from the guilty man, accompanied by the demand that his counsel continue in his case to the end. At first Mr. Phillips proposed to retire at once from the case; but, on advising with eminent counsel, he was told that it would be wrong for him to betray the prisoner's confidence, and practically to testify against him, by deserting him at that hour. He then continued in the case, but, as is shown conclusively in his statement of the facts, with its accompanying proofs, without saying a word or doing a thing that might properly be deemed in the realm of false assertion or intimations.[1]
[Footnote 1: See Sharswood's Legal Ethics, pp. 103-107, 183-196.]
The very prominence given in the public press to the charges against Mr. Phillips, and to their refutation, are added proof that the moral sense of the community is against falsehood under any circumstances or in any profession.
Members of the legal profession are bound by the same ethical obligations as other men; yet the civil law, in connection with which they practice their profession, is not in all points identical with the moral law; although it is not in conflict with any of its particulars. As Chancellor Kent says: "Human laws are not so perfect as the dictates of conscience, and the sphere of morality is more enlarged than the limits of civil jurisdiction. There are many duties that belong to the class of imperfect obligations, which are binding on conscience, but which human laws do not and cannot undertake directly to enforce. But when the aid of a Court of Equity is sought to carry into execution … a contract, then the principles of ethics have a more extensive sway."[1]
[Footnote 1: Kent's Commentaries, Lect. 39, p. 490 f. (4th ed.); cited in Story's Equity Jurisprudence, VI., p. 229 (13th ed.).]
In the decisions of Equity courts, while the duty of absolute truthfulness between parties in interest is insisted on as vital, and a suppression of the truth from one who had a right to its knowledge, or a suggestion of that which is untrue in a similar case("suggestio falsi aut suppressio veri"), is deemed an element of fraud, the distinction between mere silence when one is entitled to be silent, and concealment with the purpose of deception, is distinctly recognized, as it is not in all manuals on ethics.[1] This is indicated, on the one hand, in the legal maxim Aliud est celare, aliud tacere,—"It is one thing to conceal, another to be silent;" silence is not necessarily deceptive concealment;[2] and on the other hand in such a statement as this, in Benjamin's great work on Sales: "The nondisclosure of hidden facts [to a party in interest] is the more objectionable when any artifice is employed to throw the buyer off his guard; as by telling half the truth."[3] It is not in any principles which are recognized by the legal profession as binding on the conscience, that loose ethics are to find defense or support.
[Footnote 1: See Bispham's Principles of Equity, p. 261, (3d ed.); Broom's Legal Maxims, p. 781 f. (7th Am. ed.); Merrill's American and English Encyclopedia of Law, art. "Fraud."]
[Footnote 2: See Anderson's Dictionary of Law, p. 220; Abbott's Law
Dictionary, I., 53.]
[Footnote 3: Treatise on the Law of Sale of Personal Property, p. 451 f.]
But the profession that has most at stake in this discussion, and that, indeed, is most involved in its issue, is the ministerial, or clerical, profession. While it was Jewish rabbis who affirmed most positively, in olden time, the unwavering obligations of truthfulness, it was Jewish rabbis, also, who sought to find extenuation or excuse for falsehoods uttered with a good intention. And while it was Christian Fathers, like the Shepherd of Hermas, and Justin Martyr, and Basil the Great, and Augustine, who insisted that no tolerance should be allowed to falsehood or deceit, it was also Christian Fathers, like Gregory of Nyssa, and Chrysostom, who having practiced deceit for what they deemed a good end, first attempted a special plea for such falsities as they had found convenient in their professional labors. And it was other Christian Fathers, like Origen and Jerome, who sought to find arguments for laxity of practice, at this point, in the course of the Apostles themselves.
All the way along the centuries, while the strongest defenders of the law of truthfulness have been found among clergymen, more has been written in favor of the lie of necessity by clergymen than by men of any other class or profession. And if it be true, as many of these have claimed, that deceit and falsehood are a duty, on the part of a God-loving teacher, toward those persons who, through weakness, or mental incapacity, or moral obliquity, are in the relation to him of wards of love, or of subjects of guardianship, there is no profession in which there is more of a call for godly deception, and for holy falsehood, than the Christian ministry. If it be true that a lie, or a falsehood, is justifiable in order to the saving of the physical life of another, how much better were it to tell such a lie in the loving desire to save a soul.
If the lie of necessity be allowable for any purpose, it would seem to be more important as a means of good in the exercise of the ministerial profession, than of any other profession or occupation. And if it be understood that this is the case, what dependence can be put, by the average hearer, on the most earnest words of a preacher, who may be declaring a truth from God, and who, on the other hand, may be uttering falsehoods in love? And if it be true, also, as some of these clergymen have claimed, that God specifically approved falsehood and deception, according to the Bible record, and that Jesus Christ practiced in this line, while here on earth, what measure of confidence can fallible man place in the sacred text as it has come to him? The statement of this view of the case, is the best refutation of the claim of a possible justification for the most loving lie imaginable.
The only other point remaining untouched, in this review of the centuries of discussion concerning the possible justifiableness of a lie under conceivable circumstances, is in its relation to the lower animals. It has been claimed that "all admit" that there is no impropriety in using any available means for the decoying of fish or of beasts to their death, or in saving one's self from an enraged animal; hence that a lie is not to be counted as a sin per se, but depends for its moral value on the relation subsisting between its utterer and the one toward whom it is uttered.
Dr. Dabney, who is far less clear and sound than Dr. Thornwell in his reasoning on this ethical question, says: "I presume that no man would feel himself guilty for deceiving a mad dog in order to destroy him;"[1] and he argues from this assumption that when a man, through insanity or malice, "is not a rational man, but a brute," he may fairly be deemed as outside of the pale of humanity, so far as the obligations of veracity, viewed only as a social virtue, are concerned.
[Footnote 1: Dabney's Theology (second edition), p. 425 f.]
Dr. Newman Smyth expands this idea.[1] He says: "We may say that animals, strictly speaking, can have no immediate right to our words of truth, since they belong below the line of existence which marks the beginning of any functions of speech." He adds that animals "may have direct claims upon our humanity, and so indirectly put us under obligations to give them straightforward and fair treatment," and that "truthfulness to the domestic animal, to the horse or the dog, is to be included as a part of our general obligation of kindness to creatures that are entirely dependent upon our fidelity to them and their wants." But he cites the driving of horses with blinders,[2] and the fishing for trout with artificial flies, as evidence of the fact that man recognizes no sinfulness in the deceiving of the lower animals, and hence that the duty of veracity is not one of universal obligation.
[Footnote 1: Smyth's Christian Ethics, p. 398.]
[Footnote 2: Here is another illustration of Dr. Smyth's strange confusion of concealment with deception. It would seem as though a man must have blinders before his own eyes, to render him incapable of perceiving the difference between concealing a possible cause of fright from an animal, and intentionally deceiving that animal.]
If, indeed, the duty of truthfulness were only a social obligation, there might be a force in this reasoning that is lacking when we see that falsehood and deceit are against the very nature of God, and are a violation of man's primal nature. A lie is a sin, whenever and however and to whomsoever spoken or acted. It is a sin against God when uttered in his sight.
Man is given authority from God over all the lower animals;[1] and he is empowered to take their lives, if necessary for his protection or for his sustenance. In the exercise of this right, man is entitled to conceal from the animals he would kill or capture the means employed for the purpose; as he is entitled to conceal similarly from his fellow-man, when he is authorized to kill him as an enemy, in time of war waged for God. Thus it is quite proper for a man to conceal the hook or the net from the fish, or the trap or the pitfall from the beast; but it is not proper to deceive an animal by an imitation of the cry of the animal's offspring in order to lure that animal to its destruction; and the moral sense of the human race makes this distinction.
[Footnote 1: Gen. 1:28; 9:1-3.]
An illustration that has been put forward, as involving a nice question in the treatment of an animal, is that of going toward a loose horse with a proffered tuft of grass in one hand, and a halter for his capture concealed behind the back in the other hand. It is right to conceal the halter, and to proffer the grass, provided they are used severally in their proper relations. If the grass be held forth as an assurance of the readiness of the man to provide for the needs of the horse, and it be given to him when he comes for it, there is no deception practiced so far; and if, when horse and man are thus on good terms, the man brings out the halter for its use in the relation of master and servitor between the two, that also is proper, and the horse would so understand it. But if the man were to refuse the grass to the horse, when the two had come together, and were to substitute for it the halter, the man would do wrong, and the horse would recognize the fact, and not be caught again in that way.
Even a writer like Professor Bowne, who is not quite sure as to the right in all phases of the lying question, sees this point in its psychological aspects to better advantage than those ethical writers who would look at the duty of truthfulness as mainly a social virtue: "Even in cases where we regard truth as in our own power," he says, "there are considerations of expediency which are by no means to be disregarded. There is first the psychological fact that inexactness of statement, exaggeration, unreality in speech, are sure to react upon the mental habit of the person himself, and upon the estimate in which his statements are held by others. In dealing with children, also, however convenient a romancing statement might momentarily be, it is unquestionable that exact truthfulness is the only way which does not lead to mischief. Even in dealing with animals, it pays in the long run to be truthful. The horse that is caught once by false pretenses will not be long in finding out the trick. The physician also who dissembles, quickly comes to lose the confidence of his patient, and has thereafter no way of getting himself believed."[1]
[Footnote 1: Bowne's Principles of Ethics, p. 224.]
The main question is not whether it is fair toward an animal for a man to lie to him, but whether it is fair toward a man's self, or toward God the maker of animals and of men, for a man to lie to an animal. A lie has no place, even theoretically, in the universe, unless it be in some sphere where God has no cognizance and man has no individuality.
* * * * *
It were useless to follow farther the ever-varying changes of the never-varying reasonings for the justification of the unjustifiable "lie of necessity" in the course of the passing centuries. It is evident that the specious arguments put forth by young Chrysostom, in defense of his inexcusable lie of love fifteen centuries ago, have neither been added to nor improved on by any subsequent apologist of lying and deception. The action of Chrysostom is declared by his biographers to be "utterly at variance with the principles of truth and honor," one which "every sound Christian conscience must condemn;" yet those modern ethical writers who find force and reasonableness in his now venerable though often-refuted fallacies, are sure that the moral sense of the race is with Chrysostom.
Every man who recognizes the binding force of intuitions of a primal law of truthfulness, and who gives weight to à priori arguments for the unchanging opposition of truth and falsehood, either admits, in his discussion of this question, that a lie is never justifiable, or he is obviously illogical and inconsistent in his processes of reasoning, and in his conclusions. Even those who deny any à priori argument for the superiority of truthfulness over falsehood, and whose philosophy rests on the experimental evidence of the good or evil of a given course, are generally inclined to condemn any departure from strict truthfulness as in its tendencies detrimental to the interests of society, aside from any question of its sinfulness. The only men who are thoroughly consistent in their arguments in favor of occasional lying, are those who start with the false premise that there is no higher law of ethics than that of such a love for one's neighbor as will make one ready to do whatever seems likely to advantage him in the present life.
Centuries of discussion have only brought out with added clearness the essential fact that a lie is eternally opposed to the truth; and that he who would be a worthy child of the Father of truth must refuse to employ, under any circumstances, modes of speech and action which belong exclusively to the "father of lies."
VII.
THE GIST OF THE MATTER.
It would seem that the one all-dividing line in the universe, which never changes or varies, is the line between the true and the false, between the truth and a lie. All other lines of distinction, such even as those which separate good from evil, light from darkness, purity from impurity, love from hate, are in a sense relative and variable lines, taking their decisive measure from this one primal and eternal dividing line.
This is the one line which goes back of our very conception of a personal God, or which is inherent in that conception. We cannot conceive of God as God, unless we conceive of him as the true God, and the God of truth. If there be any falsity in him, he is not the true God. Truth is of God's very nature. To admit in our thought that a lie is of God, is to admit that falsity is in him, or, in other words, that he is a false god.
A lie is the opposite of truth, and a being who will lie stands opposed to God, who by his very nature cannot lie. Hence he who lies takes a stand, by that very act, in opposition to God. Therefore if it be necessary at any time to lie, it is necessary to desert God and be in hostility to him so long as the necessity for lying continues.
If there be such a thing as a sin per se, a lie is that thing; as a lie is, in its very nature, in hostility to the being of God. Whatever, therefore, be the temptation to lie, it is a temptation to sin by lying. Whatever be the seeming gain to result from a lie, it is the seeming gain from a sin. Whatever be the apparent cost or loss from refusing to lie, it is the apparent cost or loss from refusing to sin.
Man, formed in the moral image of God, is so far a representative of God. If a man lies, he misrepresents and dishonors God, and must incur God's disapproval because of his course. This fact is recognized in the universal habit of appealing to God in witness of the truthfulness of a statement, when there is room for doubt as to its correctness. The feeling is general that a man who believes in God will not lie unto God under the solemnity of an oath. If, however, it were possible for God to approve a lie on the part of one of his children, then that child of God might confidently make solemn oath to the truth of his lie, appealing to God to bear witness to the lie—which in God's mind is, in this case, better than the truth. In God's sight an oath is no more sacred than a yea, yea; and every child of God speaks always as in the sight of God. Perjury is no more of an immorality than ordinary lying; nor is ordinary lying any less a sin than formal perjury.
The sin of lying consists primarily and chiefly in its inconsistency with the nature of God and with the nature of God's image in man. It is not mainly as a sin against one's neighbor, but it is as a sin against God and one's self, that a lie is ever and always a sin. If it were possible to lie without harming or offending one's neighbor, or even if it were possible to benefit one's fellow-man by a lie, no man could ever tell a lie, under any circumstances or for any purpose whatsoever, without doing harm to his own nature, and offending against God's very being. If a lie comes out of a man on any inducement or provocation, or for any purpose of good, that man is the worse for it. The lie is evil, and its coming out of the man is harmful to him. "The things which proceed out of the man are those that defile the man,"[1] said our Lord; and the experience of mankind bears witness to the correctness of this asseveration.
[Footnote 1: Mark 7:15.]
Yet, although the main sin and guilt and curse of a lie are ever on him who utters that lie, whatever be his motive in so doing, the evil consequences of lying are immeasurable in the community as a community; and whoever is guilty of a new lie adds to the burden of evil that weighs down society, and that tends to its disintegration and ruin. The bond of society is confidence. A lie is inconsistent with confidence; and the knowledge that a lie is, under certain circumstances, deemed proper by a man, throws doubt on all that that man says or does under any circumstances. No matter why or where the one opening for an allowable lie be made in the reservoir of public confidence, if it be made at all, the final emptying of that reservoir is merely a question of time.
To-day, as in all the days, the chief need of men, for themselves and for their fellows, is a likeness to God in the impossibility of lying; and the chief longing of the community is for such confidence of men in one another as will give them assurance that they will not lie one to another. There was never yet a lie uttered which did not bring more of harm than of good; nor will there ever be a harmless lie, while God is Truth, and Satan is the father of lies.
TOPICAL INDEX.
Abbé Sicard: cited
Abbott, Benjamin V.; cited
Abohab, Isaac: quotation from
Abraham: his deceiving
Achilles, truthfulness of
Act and speech, lying in
Advantages of lying, supposed
Africans, truthfulness among
Ahab's false prophets
Ahriman, father of lies
American Indians, habits of
Ananias and Sapphira
Anderson, Rasmus B.: cited
Animals, deception of
Aquinas, Thomas: cited
Arabs, influence of civilization on
Aristotle: cited
Army prison life, incidents in
Augustine: cited
Aurelius, Marcus: cited
Bailey: cited
Barrow, Sir John: cited
Base-ball, concealment in
Basil, friend of Chrysostom
Basil the Great: cited
Baumgarten-Crusius: cited
Benjamin, Judah P.: cited
Bergk, Theodor: cited
Bethlehem, Samuel at
Bheels, estimate of truth by
Bible: principles, not rules, in
first record of lie in
story of man's "fall" in
standard of right
forbids lying
Bible teachings on lying
Bingham, Joseph: cited
Bispham, George T.: cited
Bock, Carl: cited
Bowne, B.P., quotation from
Boyle, F.: cited
Brahmans, estimate of truth by
Briggs and Salmond: cited
Broom, Dr. Herbert: cited
Brougham, Lord: cited
Budge, E.A.: cited
Bunsen, C.K.J,; cited
Burton, Richard: cited, 30.
Caecinna Paetus: cited
Calvin, John: cited
Carlyle, Thomas: cited
Cartwright, William C.: cited
Chastity, lying to save
Children's right to truth
Choosing between duties
Christ, example of
Christian ethics, basis of
Christian Fathers, discussion by
Christians, early, discussion by
Chrysostom: cited
Cicero: cited
Clergymen, position of
Clive, Lord: cited
Coleridge, S.T.: cited
Concealment, justifiable
Concealment, unjustifiable
Confidence essential to society
Contract, overpressing theory of
Conway, Moncure D.: cited
Court, oath in
Courvoisier, trial of
Crime, lying to prevent
Cyprian: cited
Dabney, Dr. R.L.: cited
Darius, inscription of
David: his deceiving
"Deans, Jeanie," story of
Deception: antagonistic to nature of God
among Phoenicians
by Hebrew midwives
by Rahab
by Jacob
Samuel charged with
Micah charged with
by Abraham
by Isaac
by David
by Ananias and Sapphira
in speech and in act
concealment not necessarily
purposed and resultant
of lower animals
in medical profession
of insane
in flag of truce
teaching of Talmudists as to
Peter and Paul charged with
teaching of Jesuits
of the intoxicated
Elisha charged with
Joshua charged with
in legal profession
in ministerial profession,
Definitions of lie
Denham: cited
De Wette: cited
Dick, Dr., quotation from
Dorner, Dr. Isaac A.: cited
Drona, story of Yudhishthira and
Duns Scotus: cited
Duty: of truthfulness;
of disclosure, conditional;
choosing of more important;
of right concealment;
to God not to be counted out.
Dyaks; their truthfulness
Earl, G.W.: cited
Early Christians, temptations of
East Africans, estimate of truth by
Egyptian idea of deity synonymous with truth
Elisha and Syrians
Enemy, duty of truthfulness to
Esau, deceit practiced on
Eunomius: cited
Evil as a means of good
Exigency, lie of (see Lie of Necessity)
False impressions, limit of responsibility for
Falsehood: estimate of, in India;
in Ceylon;
in Persia;
in Egypt;
"Punic faith," synonym of;
in medical profession;
its use as means of good;
spoken in love;
in legal profession.
Family troubles, concealment of
Fichte: cited
Firmus, Bishop: cited
Flag of truce, sending of
Flatt: cited
Forsyth, Capt. J.: cited
Fowler, Professor: cited
Frankness, brutal
Fridthjof and Ingeborg, story of
Fürstenthal, R.J.: cited
German ideal of truth
Glasfurd: cited
God: killing, but not lying, a possibility with;
cannot lie;
his concealments from man;
is truth;
called to witness lie;
Greeks, ancient: their estimate of truth
Gregory of Nyssa: cited
"Hall of two truths"
Hamburger, Dr. I.: cited
Hannibal: cited
Harischandra, story of
Harkness, Capt. Henry: cited
Harless: cited
Hartenstein: cited
Heber, Bishop: cited
Hebrew midwives
Hebrew spies
Hegel: cited
Heralds' law
Herbart: cited
Hennas, Shepherd of: cited
Herodotus: cited
Hill Tribes of India: their estimate of truth
Hindoo; estimate of truth;
passion-play.
Hodge, Dr. Charles; cited
"Home of Song"
"Home of the Lie"
Hottentot, estimate of truth
Hugo, Victor: cited
Hunter, W.W.: cited
Ilai, Rabbi: cited
Iliad, estimate of truth in
Indians, American, influence of civilization on
Ingeborg and Fridthjof of, story of
Innocent III.: cited
Insane: lying to
their right to truth
Inscription of Darius
Intoxicated, the: their right to truth
Isaac: his deceiving
Isaac, Jacob, and Esau
Ishmael, Rabbi: cited
Jackson, Prof. A.V.W.: cited
Jacob: his deceiving
his lie to Isaac
Jacobi, F.H.: cited
Javanese: their truthfulness
Jehoshaphat and Ahab
Jehuda, Rabbi: cited
Jerome: cited
Jesuits, teaching of
Jewish Talmudists, discussions of
Johnson's Cyclopaedia: cited
Judith and Holofernes
Justin Martyr: cited
Juvenal: cited
Kant, Immanuel: cited
Keating, W.H.: cited
Kent, Chancellor: cited
Khonds of Central India, truthfulness among
Killing an enemy or lying to him
Kirkbride, Dr. Thomas S., testimony of
Kolben, P.: cited
Krause: cited
Kurtz, Prof. J.H.: cited
Lamberton, Prof. W.A.: cited
Lecky, W.E.H.: cited
Legal profession, ethics of
Legends, Scandinavian
Liar: an enemy of righteousness
form of prayer for
Liars, place of
Libby Prison, incident of
Lichtenberger, F.: cited
Life, losing of truth to save
Life insurance, truthfulness in
Lightfoot, Bishop: cited
Liguori: cited
Livingstone, David: cited
Logic swayed by feeling
Loyola, Ignatius: cited
Luther, Martin: cited
MA, symbol of Truth
Macaulay, Lord, on Lord Clive's treachery
Macpherson, Lieutenant: cited
Mahabharata on lying
Mahaffy, Prof. J.P.: cited
Mandingoes: their estimate of truth
Marcus Aurelius, quotation from
Marheineke: cited
Marriage, duty of truthfulness in connection with
Marshman, Joshua: cited
Martensen, Hans Lassen: cited
Martineau, Dr. James, quotations from
Martyrdom price of truth-telling
Mead, Professor: cited
Medical profession, no justifiable falsehood in
Melanchthon: cited
Menorath Hammaor, reference to
Merrill, J.H.: cited
Meyer, Dr. H.A.W.: cited
Meyrick, Rev. F.: cited
Micaiah, story of
Midwives, Hebrew, lies of
Mithra, god of truth
Moore, William: cited
Moral sense of man against lying
Morgan: cited
Müller, Julius: cited
Müller, Prof. Max: cited Murderer, concealment from would-be
Nathan, Rabbi: cited
Neander: cited
Nitzsch: cited
Oath of witness in court
Omichund, deceit practiced on
One all-dividing line
Origen: cited
Ormuzd, Zoroastrian god of truth
Paley, Dr.: definition of lie
Palgrave, W.G.: cited
Paradise, two pictures of
Park, Mungo: cited
Pascal: cited
Passion-play, Hindoo
Patagonians: their view of lying
Patient, deception of, by physician
Paul and Peter: suggestion of their deceiving
Perjury justifiable, if lying be
Persian ideals
Peter and Paul: suggestion of their deceiving
Phillips, Charles, misrepresented
Philoctetes, tragedy of
Phoenicians: their untruthfulness
Physician, lying by
Pindar: cited
Place of liars
Plato: cited
Pliny the younger: cited
Pope Innocent III.: cited
Prayer, form of, for liar
Principles, not rules, Bible standard
Priscillianists, sect of
Prophets, lying
Plan, lord of truth
"Punic faith," synonym of falsehood
Pylades and Orestes
Quaker and salesman
"Quaker guns," concealment by means of
Ra, symbol of light
Raba: cited
Raffles, Sir T.S.: cited
Rahab the harlot, lying of
Rawlinson, Prof. George: cited
Reinhard: cited
Responsibility, limit of
Robber: concealment from
lying to
Roberts, Joseph, quotation from
Rock of Behistun, inscription on
Roman Catholic writers, views of
Roman matron, story of: cited by Pliny
Roman standard of truthfulness
Rothe, Richard: cited
St. John, Sir Spencer: cited
Samuel at Bethlehem
Sapphira: her deceiving
Satan, "father of lies"
Sayce, Prof. A.H.: cited
Scandinavian legends
Schaff, Dr. Philip: cited
Schaff-Hertzog: cited
Schleiermacher: cited
Schoolcraft, H.R.: cited
Schwartz: cited
Scott Sir Walter: cited
Self-deception in others, limit of responsibility for
Semple, J.W.: cited
Sharswood, Chief-Justice: cited
Shepherd of Hermas, quotation from
Sherwill: cited
Shorn, Dr. J.: cited
Sick: their right to truth
Simplice, Sister, story of
Sin per se, lying
Smith and Cheetham: cited
Smith and Wace: cited
Smyth, Dr. Newman: cited
Sonthals, truthfulness among
South, Dr. Robert: cited
Sowrahs, truthfulness among
Speech and act, lying in
Spencer, Herbert: cited
Spies, Hebrew, Rahab and
Spy denied soldier's death
Stephen, Leslie: cited
Story, Justice: cited
Surgeon's responsibility for his action
testimony as to deceiving patient
Symonds J.A.: cited
Syrians, Elisha and
Talmud, teachings of
Talmudists, discussion among
Taylor, Jeremy; cited
Teaching of Jesuits
Temptations influencing decision
Tertullian: cited
Theognis: cited
Thornwell, Dr. James H.: cited
Tipperahs: their habit of lying
Todas, truthfulness among
Tragedy of Philoctetes
Truce, flag of, use of
Truth: universal duty of telling
God is
not every one entitled to full
dearer than life
justifiable concealment of
unjustifiable concealment of
Truth, estimate of: among Hindoos
among Scandinavians
in ancient Persia
in ancient Egypt
among Romans
among ancient Greeks
among ancient Germans
among Hill Tribes of India
among Arabs
among American Indians
among Patagonians
among Africans
among Dyaks
among Veddahs
among Javanese
Ueberweg, F.: cited
Ulysses, reference to
Urim and Thummim
Veddahs of Ceylon: their truthfulness
Veracity: duty of
of Greeks
of Persians
of primitive and civilized peoples compared
of Hill Tribes of India
of Arabs
of American Indians
of Africans
of Dyaks
of Veddahs
of Javanese
Viswamitra and Indra, story of
Von Ammon: cited
Von Hirscher: cited
Walker, Helen, example of
War: justifiable concealment in
duty of veracity in
Westcott, Bishop: cited
Wheeler, J. Talboys; cited
Whewell, Dr. William: cited
"White lie"
Wig, concealment by
Wilkinson, Sir J.G.: cited
Witness, oath of, in court
Woolsey, President: cited
Wuttke, Dr. Adolf: cited
Yudhishthira and Drona, mythical story of
Zoroastrian designation of heaven and hell
SCRIPTURAL INDEX.
GENESIS.
1: 28
2 and 3
3: 6, 7
9: 1-3
12: 10-19
12: 14-20
16: 1-6
25: 27-34
26: 6-10
27: 1-40
27: 6-29
28: 1-22
39: 8-21
EXODUS.
1: 15-19
1: 15-21
1: 19, 20
1: 20, 21
LEVITICUS.
8: 8
18: 5
19: 2, 12, 13, 34-37
19: 11
NUMBERS.
23: 19
DEUTERONOMY.
29: 29
JOSHUA.
2: 1-21
8: 1-26
24: 3
1 SAMUEL. 7: 15-17 9: 22-24 11: 14, 15 13: 14 15: 29 16: 1, 2 16: 1-3 20: 29 21: 1, 2
2 SAMUEL.
11: 1-27
1 KINGS.
22: 1-23
2 KINGS.
6: 14-20
7: 6
20: 12-19
2 CHRONICLES.
18: 1-34
20: 7
PSALMS.
31: 5
58: 3
62: 4
63: 11
101: 7
116: 11
120: 2
146: 6
PROVERBS.
6: 16, 17
14: 5
19: 5, 9, 22
ISAIAH. 41: 8 51: 2
MATTHEW. 3: 9
MARK. 6: 48 7: 15
LUKE.
24: 28
JOHN.
7: 8
8: 44
14: 6
16: 12
ACTS.
5: 1-11
13: 22
ROMANS. 3: 4 3: 7, 8 4: 12
GALATIANS. 2: 11-14 3: 9
EPHESIANS.
4: 25
COLOSSIANS.
3: 9
TITUS.
1: 2
HEBREWS.
6: 18
11: 31
JAMES.
2: 23
1 JOHN.
5: 7
REVELATION. 21: 5-8 22