your health was failing–a wholly commendable lie, since it cost you
nothing and pleased the other man. If a stranger called and interrupted
you, you said with your hearty tongue, “I’m glad to see you,” and said
with your heartier soul, “I wish you were with the cannibals and it was
dinner-time.” When he went, you said regretfully, “Must you go?” and
followed it with a “Call again”; but you did no harm, for you did not
deceive anybody nor inflict any hurt, whereas the truth would have made
you both unhappy.
I think that all this courteous lying is a sweet and loving art, and
should be cultivated, The highest perfection of politeness is only a
beautiful edifice, built, from the base to the dome, of graceful and
gilded forms of charitable and unselfish lying.
What I bemoan is the growing prevalence of the brutal truth. Let us do
what we can to eradicate it. An injurious truth has no merit over an
injurious lie. Neither should ever be uttered. The man who speaks an
injurious truth, lest his soul be not saved if he do otherwise, should
reflect that that sort of a soul is not strictly worth saving. The man
who tells a lie to help a poor devil out of trouble is one of whom the
angels doubtless say, “Lo, here is an heroic soul who casts his own
welfare into jeopardy to succor his neighbor’s; let us exalt this
magnanimous liar.”
An injurious lie is an uncommendable thing; and so, also, and in the same
degree, is an injurious truth–a fact which is recognized by the law of
libel.
Among other common lies, we have the silent lie the deception which one
conveys by simply keeping still and concealing the truth. Many obstinate
truth-mongers indulge in this dissipation, imagining that if they speak
no lie, they lie not at all. In that far country where I once lived,
there was a lovely spirit, a lady whose impulses were always high and
pure, and whose character answered to them. One day I was there at
dinner, and remarked, in a general way, that we are all liars. She was
amazed, and said, “Not all!” It was before “Pinafore’s” time so I did
not make the response which would naturally follow in our day, but
frankly said, “Yes, all–we are all liars; there are no exceptions.”
She looked almost offended, and said, “Why, do you include me?”
“Certainly,” I said, “I think you even rank as an expert.” She said,
“‘Sh!–‘sh! the children!”
So the subject was changed in deference to the children’s presence, and
we went on talking about other things. But as soon as the young people
were out of the way, the lady came warmly back to the matter and said,
“I have made it the rule of my life to never tell a lie; and I have never
departed from it in a single instance.” I said, “I don’t mean the least
harm or disrespect, but really you have been lying like smoke ever since
I’ve been sitting here. It has caused me a good deal of pain, because I
am not used to it.” She required of me an instance–just a single
instance. So I said:
“Well, here is the unfilled duplicate of the blank which the Oakland
hospital people sent to you by the hand of the sick-nurse when she came
here to nurse your little nephew through his dangerous illness. This
blank asks all manner of questions as to the conduct of that sick-nurse:
‘Did she ever sleep on her watch? Did she ever forget to give the
medicine?’ and so forth and so on. You are warned to be very careful and
explicit in your answers, for the welfare of the service requires that
the nurses be promptly fined or otherwise punished for derelictions.
You told me you were perfectly delighted with that nurse–that she had a
thousand perfections and only one fault: you found you never could depend
on her wrapping Johnny up half sufficiently while he waited in a chilly
chair for her to rearrange the warm bed. You filled up the duplicate of
this paper, and sent it back to the hospital by the hand of the nurse.