Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 53.djvu/211

Rh It will not do to say that we all know that it is wrong to lie, and right to speak the truth, and that there the whole matter ends. For we shall discover, if I mistake not, that in the rediscussion even of a topic so old and apparently threadbare as this we shall come upon some points of theoretical and practical importance which, if not altogether new, may derive an element of novelty from restatement, and which at any rate will be found to furnish food for thought.

What, then, do we mean by veracity? In nine cases out of ten the answer given would be: By veracity we mean simply telling the truth; or, in other words, the making of such statements only as we believe to accord with facts. Now, this rough definition gives what we may describe as the solid substratum or foundation principle of veracity, though it is, in common affairs, rarely pressed to its full meaning. Hence we may accept it as far as it goes. Veracity will always signify, on the positive side, telling the truth; and on the negative, the avoidance of statements not in harmony with facts. But, ethically considered, while it denotes all this, it also connotes a good deal more than this; and some of its more important implications call for distinct formulation.

The complete conception of truthfulness, then, must in the first place be taken to embrace, not only the habit of saying that the thing which is so is so, but also constant care in conveying at all times the correct impression in regard to facts, and that impression only. That in every kind of prevarication, dissembling, and evasion we fall short of strict veracity, even when no directly false statement is made, is a commonly accepted principle; and in current parlance we condemn also as immoral the silence which leaves another in ignorance or with a distorted notion of reality, when we are in a position to set him right. But it is not so generally recognized that overcoloring of any sort, introduced for any purpose, exaggeration, the trick of extravagant epithets, the indiscriminate use of expletives, are to be adjudged as untruthful. How difficult it is to keep the straight line in these matters every one knows who has had occasion to tell a number of times over the story of any adventure or curious experience. Before long the magnifying tendency is almost certain to show itself; the adjectives grow a trifle stronger, the language a shade more pronounced; and unconsciously we presently begin to mold our material with an eye not upon accuracy, but upon effect. Then, after a while, like the redoubtable Tartarin de Tarascon, we lose sight of the plain and simple facts, and take our own more or less imaginative version of the story as correct in outline and color, thus deceiving ourselves.

Our common carelessness in ordinary conversation is revealed by the random employment of superlatives, characteristic of all of us, but of women perhaps more than of men; the highly charged