he that will set out to lie without having cast up his action and judged it this way and that, will fail, not in his lie, indeed, but in the object of it; which is, imprimis, to deceive, but in ultimis or fundamentally, to obtain profit by his deceit, as aristotle and another clearly show. for they that lie, lie not vainly and wantonly as for sport (saving a very few that are habitual), but rather for some good to be got or evil to be evaded: as when men lie of their prowess with the fist, though they have fought none—no, not even little children—or in the field, though they have done no more than shoot a naked blackamoor at a furlong. these lie for honour. not so our stockers and jobbers, who lie for money direct, or our parliament men, who lie bestraught lest worse befall them.
[pg 208]
lies are distinguished by the wise into the pleasant and the useful, and again into the beautiful and the necessary. thus a lie giving comfort to him that utters it is of the lie pleasant, a grateful thing, a cozening. this kind of lies is very much used among women. this sort will also make out good to the teller, evil to the told, for the pleasure the cheat gives; as, when one says to another that his worst actions are now known and are to be seen printed privately in a midland sheet, and bids him fly.
the lie useful has been set out ut supra, which consult; and may be best judged by one needing money. let him ask for the same and see how he shall be met; all answers to him shall be of this form of lie. it is also of this kind when a man having no purse or no desire to pay puts sickness on in a carriage, whether by rail or in the street, crying out: "help! help!" and wagging his head and sinking his chin upon his breast, while his feet patter and his lips dribble. also let him roll his eyes. then[pg 209] some will say: "it is the heat! the poor fellow is overcome!" others, "make way! make way!" others, men of means, will ask for the police, whereat the poorer men present will make off. but chiefly they that should have taken the fare will feel kindly and will lift the liar up gently and convey him and put him to good comfort in some waiting place or other till he be himself—and all the while clean forget his passage. for such is the nature of their rules. lord hincksey, now dead, was very much given to this kind of lie, and thought it profitable.
you shall lie at large and not be discovered; or a little, and for once, and yet come to public shame, as it was with ananias and his good wife sapphira in holy scripture, who lied but once and that was too often. while many have lied all their lives long and come to no harm, like john ade, of north-chapel, for many years a witness in the courts that lied professionally, then a money-lender, and lastly a parliament-man for the county: yet he had no hurt of all[pg 210] this that any man could see, but died easily in another man's bed, being eighty-three years of age or thereabouts, and was very honourably buried in petworth at a great charge. but some say he is now in hell, which god grant!
there is no lie like the winsome, pretty, flattering, dilating eyelid-and-lip-and-brow-lifting lie such as is used by beauty impoverished, when land is at stake. by this sort of lie many men's estates have been saved, none lost, and good done at no expense save to holiness. of the same suit also is the lie that keeps a parasite in a rich man's house, or a mixer attendant upon a painter, a model upon a sculptor, and beggars upon all men.
fools will believe their lies, but wise men also will take delight in them, as did the honourable mr. gherkin, for some time his majesty's minister of state for the lord knows what, who, when policemen would beslaver him, and put their hands to their heads and pay court in a low way, told all that saw it what mummery it was; yet inwardly was pleased. the more at a[pg 211] loss was he when, being by an accident in the minories too late and his hat lost, his coat torn and muddy, he made to accost an officer, and civilly saying, "hi——" had got no further but he took such a crack on the crown with a truncheon as laid him out for dead, and he is not now the same as he was, nor ever will be.
ministers of religion will both show forth to the people the evil of lying and will also lie themselves in a particular manner, very distinct and formidable: as was clear when one denounced from the pulpit the dreadful vice of hypocrisy and false seeming, whereat a drunkard not yet sober, hearing him say, "show me the hypocrite!" rose where he was, full in church, and pointed to the pulpit, so that he was thrust out for truth-telling by gesture in that sacred place; as was that other who, when the preacher came to "show me the drunkard," jerked his thumb over his shoulder at the parson's wife: a very mutinous act. but to lying.
he that takes lying easily will take life hardly; as the saw has it, "easy lying makes[pg 212] hard hearing," but your constructed and considered, your well-drafted lie—that is the lie for men grown, men discreet and fortunate. to which effect also the poet shakespeare says in his sonnets—but no matter! the passage is not for our ears or time, dealing with a dark woman that would have her will: as women also must if the world is to wag, which leads me to that sort of lie common to all the sex of which we men say that it is the marvellous, the potent, the dextrous, the thorough, or better still, the mysterious, the uncircumvented and not explainable, the stopping-short and confounding-against-right-reason lie, the triumphant lie of eve our mother: iseult our sister: judith, an aunt of ours, who saved a city, and jael, of holy memory.
but if any man think to explain that sort of lie, he is an ass for his pains; and if any man seek to copy it he is an ass sublimate or compound, for he attempts the mastery of women.
which no man yet has had of god, or will.
amen.
