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Tuesday, October 25, 2005
Liar, liar!
By Henrylito D. Tacio
Regarding Henry
GENESIS chapter 3, verses 4 to 5, recorded the first lie ever told to a person. The serpent told Eve, the world's first woman, to eat the fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden: "You will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." She did and also asked Adam to do the same. "She deceiving, I believing; what need lovers wish for more?" wonder Sir Charles Sedley. William Shakespeare is even more direct: "When my love swears that she is made of truth, I do believe her, though I know she lies."
But what did American president Thomas Jefferson once said about lying? "He who permits himself to tell a lie once finds it much easier to do it a second and a third time till at length it becomes habitual," he said. To an inveterate liar, truth is stranger than fiction.
Remember Richard M. Nixon, the only American president to resign without completing an elected term? His second term was cut short by a series of scandals starting with the burglary in the Watergate office complex on June 17, 1972. On July 16, 1973, a White House aide, under questioning by a Senate committee, revealed that most of Nixon's office conversation and phone calls had been recorded.
Nixon claimed executive privilege to keep the tapes secret and the courts and Congress sought the tapes for criminal proceedings against former White House aides and for a House inquiry into possible impeachment. "I have nothing to hide," Nixon declared. "The White House has nothing to hide."
On July 24, 1974, the Supreme Court ruled that Nixon's claim of executive privilege must fall before the special prosecutor's subpoenas of tapes relevant to criminal trial proceedings. That same day, the House Judiciary Committee opened debate on impeachment.
On July 30, the committee recommended House adoption of three articles of impeachment charging Nixon with obstruction of justice, abuse of power, and contempt of Congress. Sounds familiar, huh?
On August 5, Nixon released transcript of conversations held six days after the Watergate break-in showing that Nixon had known of, approved, and directed Watergate cover-up activities. Nixon resigned from office on August 9. How fast, indeed! Henry L. Mencken pointed out: "The men the American people admire most extravagantly are the most daring liars; the men they detest most violently are those who try to tell them the truth."
"All the historical books which contain no lies are extremely tedious," Anatole France wrote. Adolf Hitler contributes, "In the size of the lie is always contained a certain factor of credulity, since the great masses of the people will more easily fall victims to a great lie than to a small one."
Winston Churchill reminds us: "There are a terrible lot of lies going about the world, and the worst of it is that half of them are true." To which Mark Twain reiterated, "A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes." And truth is indeed the other side of the coin. "The truth is more important than the facts," Frank Lloyd Wright said. Thomas Cooper likewise admitted: "Fraud and falsehood only dread examination. Truth invites it."
Phillips Brooks stated: "Truth is always strong, no matter how weak it looks, and falsehood is always weak, no matter how strong it looks." Goethe advocates: "It is much easier to recognize error than to find truth, for error lies on the surface and may be overcome; but truth lies in the depths, and to search for it is not given to everyone."
Yes, truth hurts. Sylvanus and Evelyn Duvall admit, "Sometimes the kindest thing you can do for a person is to tell him a truth that will prove very painful. But in so doing, you may have saved him from serious harm or even greater pain. In a world such as ours, people must learn to 'take it.' A painless world is not necessarily a good world."
Again, in the White House, according to Carl Riblet, Jr., there are three kinds of truth: "Truth that must be hidden because of fear, truth that must be saved for the right moment, and the truth that is leaked." At first, truth makes you miserable. But the Bible adds: "Seek the truth and the truth shall set you free."
For comments and feedback, write me at tasyo2002@yahoo.com
For Bisaya stories from Davao. Click here. (October 25, 2005 issue)
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