Page:The Praises of Amida, 1907.djvu/63

 peace, he was equally a dissembler in the latter case, when he instigated war; for in neither case did he lay bare the whole of his heart in all its depths. But if we make allowances for him in the first case, should we not equally make allowances in the second? Nay, rather, are not we ourselves guilty of the same sin of dissembling? For the moment, it may be, the sky is clear,—that is, heart, mouth, and body may all be righteous and pure. But the germ of all evil lies within us, and so weak are we that we cannot tell when the evil will break out, nor what form it will take. Nay, if we look back on ourselves, we shall see that sin is not only a possibility but an actuality, and that in some degree at least we have been guilty of all sins. Why, then, should we be so proudly contemptuous of Nicholas II?

We call him a liar. Could we live without telling a lie,—once a mouth, say, or once a fortnight,...or even once a day? We call him a hypocrite. Are we never double-faced ourselves,—dissemblers with many faces? The