Meade County news. [volume] (Meade, Kan.) 1900-1918, 1903-07-02

SnadeS OF Anan1aS! French theO-
logan has written book in defense
of lying. The dispatch says the
work was published by permission of
the vicar general, who is evidently
something of liar himself The
exact excuse for this book is not au-
thenticated, unless previous authors
had exhausted every known text or
sensation prior to the French gentle
mans taking his pen in hand.
Be this as it may. this remarkable
book goes so far as to maintain that
a man may even prevaricate to his
wife, and vice versa. Married men
who have been stretching the truth
now and then and feeling conscien-
tiously uncomfortable under the up
braidings of their inner consciousness,
may go out in the woodshed and
shake hands with themselves. George
Washington and his cherry tree are
no longer au fait, the office boys
grandmother may die as often as the
lad chooses and the hub" who goes
out to get a drink while the prima
donna changes her pink tights, may
still insist, and with much better
favor, that he has been to see
man."
Plate once asked, Testing apart,
what is TRUTH" The fact that the
query has never been answered can
make little difference now when a man
may live, not by the Good Book which
says Thou shalt not lie," but by the
theologian's book which says in spirit,
Lie plenty when you feel like it,"
Just how st. Peter will look upon
liars we have known" when they
seek admittance at his gate, is a
mooted question, and yet, while the
Frenchman's theories may seem
spectacular departure from the stat
utes, history corrects the impression.
Henry Garnet, Jesuit, tried as con-
spirator in the Gunpowder Plot, said:
in moral affairs, and in the COM
mon intercourse of life, when the
truth is asked among friends, it is not
lawful to use equivocation, but in
cases where it becomes necessary to
an individual for his defense, or for
avoiding any injustice or loss,
or for obtaining any important advant-
age, without danger or mischief to any
other person, there equivocation is
lawful
By these tenets a man might tell
the partner of his bed, board and
bosom that he had been bucking dy
spepsia in a bowling alley when in
reality he had been bucking the tiger
in a joss house. BY so doing he is
injuring no one, is calming his wife
and, incidentally, not injuring his dys-
pcpsia.
Samuel Johnson, too, admitted there
were times when truth need net pre-
vail, despite its mightiness. Johnson
says one might falsify as to which
way a man, chased by would-be muir
derer, was running. We agree, also,
with this version.
A friend of ours, now a well-known
writer, was in Frisco and broke.
He received word that his sweetheart
was dying He had not enough money
to pay his railway transportation
home. The postoffice steps being near
and friendly, he sat down to Think
In the moment his head was between
his knees, his mother died. That is,
she died to all purposes of emergency.
Then he went to a railway passenger
agent and, with tears in his blood-shot
eyes, told how his mother had peace
fully passed away. He must catch
the first flyer to look for the last time
upon her dear, dead face. The agent
melted and as soon as the conductor
punched the ticket, the bereaved son
ducked his head between his knees and
brought his mother back to life, love
and the pursuit of happiness again.
The sweetheart, cheered by his pres
ence, rallied and in after years he
married her and learned to lie with
,neatness and dispatch. He was a
versatile cuss.
From these examples it will be seen
that prevarication has its moods and
lenses and much depends upon the
conjugation. AS for us, we are
pleased at the Frenchman's theology.
1t opens up new by-ways that only a
writer and a married man can appre-
ciate. Being in this category, we
get a benefit going and coming. In
other words, ZACH! there goes Louie
comm back"