6. How does Timidity teach a child to lie? How does Good-nature lead him to lie? What are some of the “polite lies” that help to make the cubes roll?
7. Which cuts most deeply a substance upon which it is rubbed—a rasp, a file, or a silken sleeve?
8. Which causes the most lies, Timidity, Good-nature or Polite-behavior?
9. Do you think the schoolmistress is right? If so, what better reasons are there for telling the truth than mere convenience and the inconvenience of lying?
10. What do you understand by “against the peace and dignity of the universe?”
11. Do you think the schoolmistress would agree with the Autocrat in his last statement as to the way in which children are taught the difference between right and wrong?
12. Do you think if a child is first taught that lying is unprofitable he will without further assistance learn that lying is wrong in itself?
13. Do you gain from the whole selection the idea that all lies, even the polite lies of society and the common and apparently harmless lies of business life, are always and wholly wrong?
[406-1] The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table is the most famous and the best of the prose works of Oliver Wendell Holmes. It consists of a series of rambling talks on a great variety of subjects, addressed to the people who sit at his table in a boarding house. Holmes himself is the “Autocrat,” and his sparkling talks are full of wit and wisdom. Among those who regularly sit at the Autocrat’s table is a schoolboy, whom he calls Benjamin Franklin, and to whom he tells this beautiful story of the Cubes of Truth.
[406-2] When the old Greek hero, Hercules, was a youth, and nearing manhood, two women appeared to him, both offering beautiful gifts. One of the women was Duty, the other Pleasure. Hercules chose to accept the gifts of Duty and to follow her. The opportunity to make this choice did not come till he was old enough to understand. In Holmes’ beautiful allegory the cubes and spheres are presented long before that time, even in early childhood.