Saturday, July 11, 1998

Our favorite vice

By DAVID YOUNT

Scripps Howard News Service

Which of the 10 Commandments do you think we honor least? Don't flatter yourself: it's not the sexy ones, nor the violent ones like murder and theft. It's the one that forbids us to lie.

Much lying is defensive: we clam up or prevaricate because we believe that something we've done (or neglected to do) is nobody's else's business. That explains much of the current resistance to allow White House lawyers and Secret Service agents to testify before a grand jury.

Sometimes we're asked to lie to protect others. In a posthumous book, convicted Whitewater banker James McDougal confessed that he "just got tired of lying for those fellas." Meanwhile his wife, Susan, languished a long time in prison for holding to the maxim, "Ask me no questions, and I'll tell you no lies."

Then there are the lies we tell to improve on reality, like Jack Benny never admitting his age to be over 39. These are white lies, often meant to flatter others, or at least to make them feel good ("What a lovely dress!" or "You're not a pound overweight!"). We justify white lies as courtesies.

If you are old enough to remember the 'Sixties, you will remember that people were urged to "tell it like it is" and "let it all hang out." But in a world of harsh realities, the unvarnished truth is a bogus virtue. There must be a measure of truth in advertising, but we are not obliged to advertise ugly and painful truths gratuitously, particularly not about others.

The really harmful lies are deceptions. Although Abraham Lincoln expressed confidence that "you can't fool all of the people all of the time," Adolf Hitler insisted that "the great masses of the people...will more easily fall victims to a great lie than to a small one" - and got away with his deception long enough to cause the deaths of millions of innocent people.

The temptation to deceive others for one's personal gain prompts some politicians and salesmen to tell tall ones to voters and consumers. A new biography of John D. Rockefeller Senior reveals that his father actually sold snake oil medicine. At the moment, a professional hypnotist in England is successfully selling his services to auto salesmen, training them to place prospective customers into a buying trance!

Can deceptions be justified? Physicians deceive when they withhold information from patients with deadly illnesses. Their justification: that the bad news will only increase suffering. As to attorneys, in his "Ethics of Advocacy," Charles Curtis writes, "I don't see why we should not come out roundly and say that one of the functions of the lawyer is to lie for his client."

Even Martin Luther justified lies for the good of the church.

"What harm would it do," he asked, "if a man told a good strong lie for the sake of the good and the Christian church...a lie out of necessity, a useful lie, a helpful lie. Such lies would not be against God; he would accept them."

The awkwardness, of course is that, when we decide to lie, for whatever reason, we are in bad company - the devil himself. Jesus called Satan "the father of the lie."

David Yount's latest book is Spiritual Simplicity (Simon & Schuster). He answers mail at P.O. Box 2758, Woodbridge, VA 22193 and dyount(at)erols.com.