A Lie Never Justifiable: A Study in Ethics

by H. Clay Trumbull

[Footnote 1: See Augustine's words on this point, quoted at p. 100, supra.]

Confounding, as always, a wise and right concealment of truth with actual falsehood, Dr. Smyth says of the duty of a teacher in the matter of imparting truth to a pupil according to the measure of the pupil's ability to receive it: "An occasional friendly use of truth as a crash towel may be wholesome; but ordinarily there is a more excellent way." That is a counting of truth precious, with a vengeance!

Dr. Smyth seems inclined to accept in the main the conclusions, on this whole subject, of Rothe, but without Rothe's measure of consistency in the argument. Rothe starts wrong, and of course ends wrong. Dr. Smyth, like Dr. Hodge, starts right and ends wrong. No sorer condemnation of Dr. Smyth's position can be made, than by the simple presentation of his own review of his own argument, when he says: "To sum up, then, what has been said concerning the so-called lies of necessity, the principle to be applied with wisdom is simply this: give the truth always to those who in the bonds of humanity have the right to the truth; conceal it or falsify it only when it is unmistakably evident that the human right to the truth from others has been forfeited, or temporarily is held in abeyance by sickness, weakness, or some criminal intent: do not in any case prevaricate, unless you can tell the necessary falsehood deliberately and positively, from principle, with a good conscience void of offense toward men, and sincere in the sight of God." What says the moral sense of humanity to such a position as that?

As over against the erroneous claim, made by Richard Rothe, and Newman Smyth, and others, that the "moral sense" of mankind is at variance with the demands of "rigid moralists," in regard to the unjustifiableness of falsehood, it is of interest to note the testimony of strong thinkers, who have written on this subject with the fullest freedom, from the standpoint of speculative philosophy, rather than of exclusively Christian ethics. For example, James Martineau, while a Christian philosopher, discusses the question of veracity as a philosopher, rather than as a Christian, in his "Types of Ethical Theory;"[1] and he insists that "veracity is strictly natural, that is, it is implied in the very nature which leads us to intercommunion in speech."

[Footnote 1: Martineau's Types of Ethical Theory, II., 255-265.]

As he sees it, a man is treacherous to himself who speaks falsely at any time to any one, and the man's moral sense recoils from his action accordingly. Dr. Martineau says: "It is perhaps, the peculiar treachery of this process which fixes upon falsehood a stamp of meanness quite exceptional; and renders it impossible, I think, to yield to its inducements, even in cases supposed to be venial, without a disgust little distinguishable from compunction. This must have been Kant's feeling when he said: 'A lie is the abandonment, or, as it were, the annihilation of the dignity of man.'"

Dr. Martineau is not so rigid a moralist but that he is ready to agree with those easy-going theologians who find a place for exceptional falsehoods in their reasoning; yet he is so true a man in his moral instincts that his nature recoils from the results of such reasoning. "After all," he says, "there is something in this problem which refuses to be thus laid to rest; and in treating it, it is hardly possible to escape the uneasiness of a certain moral inconsequence. If we consult the casuist of Common Sense he usually tells us that, in theory, Veracity can have no exceptions; but that, in practice, he is brought face to face with at least a few; and he cheerfully accepts a dispensation, when required, at the hands of Necessity.

"I confess rather to an inverse experience. The theoretic reasons for certain limits to the rule of veracity appear to me unanswerable; nor can I condemn any one who acts in accordance with them. Yet when I place myself in a like position, at one of the crises demanding a deliberate lie, an unutterable repugnance returns upon me, and makes the theory seem shameful. If brought to the test, I should probably act rather as I think than as I feel,[1] without, however, being able to escape the stab of an instant compunction and the secret wound of a long humiliation. Is this the mere weakness of superstition? It may be so. But may it not also spring from an ineradicable sense of a common humanity, still leaving social ties to even social aliens, and, in the presence of an imperishable fraternal unity, forbidding to the individual of the moment the proud right of spiritual ostracism?…"

[Footnote 1: No, a man who feels like that would be true in the hour of temptation. His doubt of himself is only the tremulousness of true courage.]

"How could I ever face the soul I had deceived, when perhaps our relations are reversed, and he meets my sins, not with self-protective repulse, but with winning love? And if with thoughts like these there also blends that inward reverence for reality which clings to the very essence of human reason, and renders it incredible, à priori, that falsehood should become an implement of good, it is perhaps intelligible how there may be an irremediable discrepancy between the dioptric certainty of the understanding and the immediate insight of the conscience: not all the rays of spiritual truth are refrangible; some there are beyond the intellectual spectrum, that wake invisible response, and tremble in the dark."