2 Samuel 18:29 And the king said, Is the young man Absalom safe? And Ahimaaz answered, When Joab sent the king's servant, and me your servant… The most delicate question in morals that people in general have to solve is, how far kindness justifies falsehood? How far may you veil or colour the truth in order to spare people's feelings? In the short run, taking the one case by itself, tenderness seems better than truth. It seems more right to save your friend from pain than to tell him how things really stand. But. in the long run, I fancy, pure truthfulness would give the most pleasure and save the most pain. Not, of course, that you need go about telling uncalled for truths; but all you do say shored be unswervingly straightforward. What comfort there is in a man or woman in whom you know there is no guile, in whose words you can wholly trust, without having to take off an unknown quantity that may have been put on to please you. On the other hand, people like the Irish, who are so kindly that they will be always garbling the truth into an agreeable shape — how they vex your soul — how you long for rough, homely truthfulness, instead of such "making things pleasant." (Charles Buxton, M. P.) Parallel Verses KJV: And the king said, Is the young man Absalom safe? And Ahimaaz answered, When Joab sent the king's servant, and me thy servant, I saw a great tumult, but I knew not what it was. |
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