"It seems to me that truth is a sort of strengthening of our minds; as in the East they would gird up their encumbering robes, so as to walk along more bravely in a difficult path. Do you think of it like that, Alice?"
"Yes," answered her sister. "I was reading these words on Sunday: 'Grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.' I suppose that has something to do with my piece of armour."
"Of course it has!" exclaimed Agnes eagerly. "And it is so difficult to combine those two things in the same person—grace and truth. People can be truthful, but they find it very hard to be gracious also; or they are so gracious that they fail to be truthful."
"I don't see how you mean," said Hugh.
"In this sort of way," answered Agnes. "One day lately, I heard a girl say something like this: Oh, you know, she asked me how I liked her drawing, and I said it was sweetly pretty; but really, you know, it was not a bit nice, nor a quarter as well done as so-and-so's.'"
"Oh, Agnes! You did not hear me say that!" exclaimed Alice, shocked.
"No, not you; but every day we hear this sort of compromise. If that girl I spoke of, had been taxed with not speaking the truth, she would have answered: Well, it was very pretty, or, if I didn't think so, she did, and that made it quite true.'"
"I would not have said such a thing for the world," exclaimed Alice.
"I am sure you would not; but I find, for myself, that these difficulties meet one at every step, and that our being 'girt about with truth' is an everyday necessity."
"I'm sure it is," said John, "in a hundred ways. If we look-out for them, they will come to us fast enough, and we shall get used to watching ourselves."