Part 9 (1/2)

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 superst.i.tion? 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, _a 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.”

Dr. Martineau's definition of right and wrong is this:[1] ”Every action is right, which, in presence of a lower principle, follows a higher: every action is wrong, which, in presence of a higher principle, follows a lower;” and his moral sense will not admit the possibility of falsehood being at any time higher than truth, or of veracity ever being lower than a lie.

[Footnote 1: _Types of Ethical Theory_, II., 270.]

Professor Thomas Fowler, of the University of Oxford, writing as a believer in the gradual evolution of morals, and basing his philosophy on experience without any recognition of _a priori_ principles, is much more nearly in accord, at this point,[1] with Martineau, than with Rothe, Hodge, and Smyth. Although he is ready to concede that a lie may, theoretically, be justifiable, he is sure that the moral sense of mankind is, at the present state of average development, against its propriety. Hence, he a.s.serts that, even when justice might deny an answer to an improper question, ”outside the limits of justice, and irrespectively of their duty to others, many persons are often restrained, and quite rightly so, from returning an untruthful or ambiguous answer by purely self-regarding feelings. They feel that to give an untruthful answer, even under such circ.u.mstances as I have supposed, would be to burden themselves with the subsequent consciousness of cowardice or lack of self-respect. And hence, whatever inconvenience or annoyance it may cost them, they tell the naked truth, rather than stand convicted to themselves of a want of courage or dignity.”

[Footnote 1: _Principles of Morals_, II., 159-161.]

”Veracity, though this was by no means always the case,” Professor Fowler continues, ”has become the point of honor in the upper ranks of modern civilized societies, and hence it is invested with a sanct.i.ty which seems to attach to no other virtue; and to the uninstructed conscience of the unreflective man, the duty of telling the truth appears, of all duties, to be the only duty which never admits of any exceptions, from the unavoidable conflict with other duties.”

He ranges the moral sense of the ”upper ranks of modern civilized societies,” and ”the uninstructed conscience of the unreflective man,”

against any tolerance of the ”lie of necessity,” leaving only the locality of Muhammad's coffin for those who are arrayed against the rigid moralists on this question.

While he admits the theoretical possibility of the ”lie of necessity,”

Professor Fowler concludes as to its practical expediency: ”Without maintaining that there are no conceivable circ.u.mstances under which a man will be justified in committing a breach of veracity, it may at least be said that, in the lives of most men, there is no case likely to occur in which the greater social good would not be attained by the observation of the general rule to tell the truth, rather than by the recognition of an exception in favor of a lie, even though that lie were told for purely benevolent reasons.” That is nearer right than the conclusions of many an inconsistent intuitionist!

Leslie Stephen, a consistent agnostic, and a believer in the slow evolution of morals, in his ”Science of Ethics,”[1] naturally holds, like Herbert Spencer, to the gradual development of the custom of truthfulness, as a necessity of society.[2] The moral sense of primitive man, as he sees it, might seem to justify falsehood to an _enemy_, rather than, as Rothe and Smyth would claim, to those who are _wards of love_. In ill.u.s.tration of this he says: ”The obligation to truthfulness is [primarily] limited to relations with members of the same tribe or state; and, more generally, it is curious to observe how a kind of local or special morality is often developed in regard to this virtue. The schoolboy thinks it a duty to his fellows to lie to his master, the merchant to his customer, and the servant to his employer; and, inversely, the duty is often recognized as between members of some little clique or profession, as soon as it is seen to be important for their corporate interest, even at the expense of the wider social organization. There is honor among thieves, both of the respectable and other varieties.”

[Footnote 1: Leslie Stephen's _Science of Ethics_, pp. 202-209.]

[Footnote 2: See pp. 26-32, _supra_.]

But Leslie Stephen sees that, in the progress of the race, the importance of veracity has come to a recognition, ”in which it differs from the other virtues.” While the law of marriage may vary at different periods, ”the rule of truthfulness, on the other hand, seems to possess the _a priori_ quality of a mathematical axiom.... Truth, in short, being always the same, truthfulness must be unvarying. Thus, 'Be truthful' means, 'Speak the truth whatever the consequences, whether the teller or the hearer receives benefit or injury.' And hence, it is inferred, truthfulness implies a quality independent of the organization of the agent or of society.” While Mr. Stephen would himself find a place for the ”lie of necessity” under conceivable circ.u.mstances, he is clear-minded enough to perceive that the moral sense of the civilized world is opposed to this view; and in this he is nearer correct than those who claim the opposite.

It is true that those who seek an approbation of their defense of falsehoods which they deem a necessity, a.s.sume, without proof, their agreement with the moral sense of the race. But it is also true that there stands opposed to their theory the best moral sense of primitive man, as shown in a wide area of investigation, and also of thinkers all the way up from the lowest moral grade to the most rigorous moralists, including intuitionists, utilitarians, and agnostics.

However deficient may be the practice of erring mortals, the ideal standard in theory, is veracity, and not falsehood.

As to the opinions of purely speculative philosophers, concerning the admissibility of the ”lie of necessity,” they have little value except as personal opinions. This question is one that cannot be discussed fairly without relation to the nature and law of G.o.d. It is of interest, however, to note that a keen mind like Kant's insists that ”the highest violation of the duty owed by man to himself, considered as a moral being singly (owed to the humanity subsisting in his person), is a departure from truth, or lying.”[1] And when a man like Fichte,[2] whom Carlyle characterizes as ”that cold, colossal, adamantine spirit, standing erect like a Cato Major among degenerate men; fit to have been the teacher of the Stoa, and to have discoursed of beauty and virtue in the groves of Academe,” declares that no measure of evil results from truth-speaking would induce him to tell a lie, a certain moral weight attaches to his testimony. And so with all the other philosophers. No attempt at exhaustiveness in their treatment is made in this work. But the fullest force of any fresh argument made by them in favor of occasional lying is recognized so far as it is known.

[Footnote 1: See Semple's _Kant's Metaphysic of Ethics_, p. 267.]

[Footnote 2: See Martensen's _Christian Ethics (Individual)_, -- 97.]

One common misquotation from a well-known philosopher, in this line, is, however, sufficiently noteworthy for special mention here. Jacobi, in his intense theism, protests against the unqualified idealism of Fichte, and the indefinite naturalism of Sch.e.l.ling; and, in his famous Letter to Fichte,[1] he says vehemently: ”But the Good what is it?

I have no answer if there be no G.o.d. As to me, this world of phenomena--if it have all its truth in these phenomena, and no more profound significance, if it have nothing beyond itself to reveal to me--becomes a repulsive phantom, in whose presence I curse the consciousness which has called it into existence, and I invoke against it annihilation as a deity. Even so, also, everything that I call good, beautiful, and sacred, turns to a chimera, disturbing my spirit, and rending the heart out of my bosom, as soon as I a.s.sume that it stands not in me as a relation to a higher, real Being,--not a mere resemblance or copy of it in me;--when, in fine, I have within me an empty and fict.i.tious consciousness only. I admit also that I know nothing of 'the Good _per se_,' or 'the True _per se_,' that I even have nothing but a vague notion of what such terms stand for. I declare that it revolts me when people seek to obtrude upon me the Will which wills nothing, this empty nut of independence and freedom in absolute indifference, and accuse me of atheism, the true and proper G.o.dlessness, because I show reluctance to accept it.”