37. Add to this, (and here is
cause to cry out more piteously,) that, if once we grant it to have
been right for the saving of that sick man’s life to tell him the
lie, that his son was alive, then, by little and little and by
minute degrees, the evil so grows upon us, and by slight accesses
to such a heap of wicked lies does it, in its almost imperceptible
encroachments, at last come, that no place can ever be any where
found on which this huge mischief, by smallest additions rising
into boundless strength, might be resisted. Wherefore, most
providently is it written, “He that despiseth small things shall
fall by little and little.”2461
Nay more: for these persons who
are so enamored of this
life, that they hesitate not to prefer it
to
truth, that a man may not
die, say rather, that a man who must
some time
die may
die somewhat later, would have us not only to
lie, but even to
swear fasely; to wit, that, lest the
vain health
of man should somewhat more quickly pass away, we should take the
name of the
Lord our
God in
vain! And there are among them
learned
men who even
fix rules, and set bounds when it is a
duty, when not
a
duty, to
commit perjury! O, where are ye,
fountains of
tears? And
what shall we do? whither go? where
hide us from the ire of
truth,
if we not only neglect to
shun lies, but
dare moreover to
teach
perjuries? For look they well to it, who uphold and
defend lying,
what
kind, or what kinds, of
lying they shall
delight to
justify:
at least in the
worship of
God let them grant that there must be no
lying; at least let them keep themselves from perjuries and
blasphemies; at least there, where
God’s name, where
God as
witness, where
God’s
oath2462
is interposed, where
God’s
religion is the matter of
discourse or colloquy, let none
lie, none
praise, none
teach and enjoin, none
justify a
lie: of the other
kinds of
lies let him choose him out that which he accounteth to be
the mildest and most
innocent kind of
lying, he who will have it to
be right to
lie. This I know, that even he who
teaches that it is
meet to tell
lies, wishes to be thought to
teach a
truth. For if it
be false which he
teaches, who would care to give heed to false
doctrine, in which both he
deceives that
teaches and he is
deceived
that
learns? But if, in order that he may be able to find some
disciple, he upholds that he
teaches a
truth when he
teaches that
it is meet to
lie, how will that
lie be of the
truth, when the
Apostle John reclaimeth, “No lie is of the truth?”
2463
It is
therefore not true, that it is sometimes right to lie; and that
which is not true to no man is at all to be persuaded.
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