The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1894-06-17

There should be hospitals for liars. or
retreats, such as we provide for the
insane, when their cases become chron-
lie and dangerous. They become dan
gerous to the community, quite as
dangerous as forgers and shopIifters,
and far worse for our own peace and
happiness. If by accident you get one
of these people into your household
you never will get the confusion rec
titled. East becomes west. Love is
perverted into evil intent. Even facts
| fail to " the truth. Everything is
wrong end foremost. Half the suicides
come from liars tongues The worst
cases should be treated as insanity
and mild cases sent to hospital.
1t would be an interesting study for
an analytic mind to study the causes
| of lying and liars. 1t is in some cases,
no doubt, matter almost wholly of
| heredity. Mothers and fathers hand
fdown moral traits more easily than
/ they do intellectual. A mother should
make law of her life to be sincere
and undertaking. If not. she is sure to
reap a sore punishment in and from
her children. Practice a habit of liv-
ling very open-hearted | co not mean
prattling facts all the while. but with
no chests locked against your beloved
ones. An open heart is better than an
open mouth. 1 have seen a boy stamp
| cealment by one thought of his mother.
She hesitated to make known the facts
| that her husband desired to know
This her mind dwelt upon; the hesita-
ton and concealment, of no great i'm
lportance in themselves. continued; the
babe was born with a propensity to be
lat least uncommunicatiVe.
1 pity really honest person who has
itumbled herself hastily MO
| T1tq iC,T n nj nd he
fore she was able to be quite self-mas-
terful she prevaricated. Now, to back
out of a lie is like backing out of a
slough of mud. You get out with mire
on you. But is it any better to stay
in the slough and wallow about
There is nothing gained, my friend, by
Isticking to a falsehood, simply because
frank as your better nature suggests
and get as quickly as possible on the
line of absolute honor.
But there are other causes for the
HAIRS chanac ter besides Incredibly. So
ciety is not based on honor but very
largely on pretenseS. The good half
of social intercourse is offset by anoth-
Ier half of deceit and insincerity. This
of course. is stamping itself on charac-
ter. People cannot live lies and not be
liars. The Quakers felt this social de-
graduation and tried to correct it. Let
your communication be yea, yea nay
nay; for whatsoever is more than this
cometh of evil. The Quakers, how.
ever, do sometimes lie; and all the
worse, because they have placed Sc
much emphasis on the yea, yea, as bet
ter than yes, yes. But they do moi
make a mistake in insisting on the i'm
portance of words. Social fiattery and
much of social manners is a cover fol
lies. There is no truth in it. Are you
a social liar?
Not a little danger comes from om
custom of written contracts. We dc
not count our words as of legal value
I have recently heard a neighbor say
bluntly: You have no contract.
Isingned nothing. My promise is of nc
importance" There are few people
that will acknowledge this condition OF
affairs, but it is a fact that as bust
ness people we are all bound together
by writings; our words are not re-
Ispected. There are heather tribes who
will not lie; we do not feel as con.
lcerned about truth-telling as truth
writing. Then our noble criminal sys
tenn is based on disregard for the
truth. The object of the lawyer is q:
often Ito prove a lie as to ferret out the
truth. Benjamin Butler had the bra,
lzenness to defend this course before
1.-the law school of a university. No Ill
innate good can come from a system
of deception. We fear mob law; bu
is our court law any less likely Il
make blunders and perpetuate brutal
ity? ARRESTS says Governor Altgeld
appear ito be the prime object, and II
protect life and property seems a sec
ondary matter" We may add that Il
get at the truth seems to be the las
matter that our courts consider. The
Iwonder is not great that the people