One of the most common forms of this kind of hypocrisy is the acting of unreal grief. At those funerals where there is the most display, there is usually the least real sorrow. "Of all who flock to swell or see the show, who cares about the corpse ?" Is not worldly pride the chief impulse, and the sable garments profusely arrayed on the occasion the most valuable part of the mourning? Pope was not the only man destined to witness what in two lines he so well described.

"Before her face her handkerchief she spread,
To hide the flood of tears she did not shed."

It is always dangerous to have anything to do with those who are too base to be honest in the appearances they assume and the sentiments they suggest. You are liable at any moment to be approached by such as the left-handed Ehud came to Eglon, with a present in his hand, but a dagger under his skirt. Nor will it be strange if the most murderous attacks are accompanied by honied terms of esteem, as Joab saluted Amasa with," Art thou in health, my brother?" and at the same moment "smote him under the fifth rib." Upon this incident, an old writer makes the following just remarks. "Had the heart of Amasa been privy to any cause of grudge, he had suspected the kiss of Joab; now his innocent eyes look to the lips, not to the hand of his secret enemy; the lips were smooth: "Art thou in health, my brother?" The hand was bloody, which smote him under the fifth rib; that unhappy hand knew well this way unto death, which with one wound hath let out the souls of two great captains, Abner and Amasa: both they were smitten by Joab, both under the fifth rib, both under a pretence of friendship. There is no enmity so dangerous as that which comes masked with love. Open hostility calls us to our guard; but there is no fence against a trusted treachery. We need not be bidden to avoid an enemy; but who would run away from a friend? Thus spiritually deals the world with our souls; it kisses us and stabs us at

once; if it did not embrace us with one hand, it could not murder us with the other: only God deliver us from the danger of our trust, and we shall be safe."

But it is time to pass to our third point. We have considered the character of falsehood assumed in unsubstantial appearance, acted in malignant suggestion, and we will now. look at it under the aspect of direct assertion.

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This is a crime which has been denounced by wise men of every age. When Aristotle was asked, what a man could gain by telling a falsehood? he replied, "Not to be credited when he shall tell the truth." Said lord Bacon, “A liar is brave towards God, and a coward towards man. For a lie faces God, and shrinks from man." The prevalence of this sin destroys personal worth and produces social anarchy. Without veracity, there can be neither virtue nor confidence anywhere. "The devils," says Sir Thomas Brown, "do not tell lies to one another; for truth is necessary to all societies; nor can the society of hell subsist without it." Shelley thought that Falsehood was the worst fiend on earth, and thus represents his murderous power in a dialogue with Vice. The latter inquires:

"VICE.

And, secret one! what hast thou done,
To compare, in thy tumid pride, with me?
1, whose career, through the blasted year,
Has been track'd by despair and agony.

FALSEHOOD.

What have I done!-I have torn the robe
From baby truth's unshelter'd form,
And round the desolated globe
Borne safely the bewildering charm:
My tyrant-slaves to a dungeon-floor
Have bound the fearless innocent,
And streams of fertilizing gore
Flow from her bosom's hideous rent,

Which this unfailing dagger gave....
I dread that blood!-no more—this day
Is ours, though her eternal ray

Must shine upon our grave.

Yet know, proud Vice, had I not given
To thee the robe I stole from heaven,
Thy shape of ugliness and fear

Had never gain'd admission here."

But the sacred word declares that the liar shall not escape. The habit of speaking lies in sport soon grows to more enormous guilt. The indulgence of falsehood effectually banishes all salutary fear. The wretch becomes too desperate in character to find any palliation at the bar of God. The warning is given beforehand, "All liars shall have their part in the lake, that burneth with fire and brimstone." Saith God, "he that speaketh lies, shall perish." The eternal Judge with whom we have to do is "A God of truth, and without iniquity; just and right is he-A God that cannot lie-Faithful and True." Nothing is more fearfully denounced by him than deceit. Under his righteous government, "lies and desolation" are linked together. "I will be a swift witness against false swearers and them that fear not me-saith the Lord of Hosts."

"Lie not, but let thy heart be true to God,
Thy mouth to it, thy actions to them both.
Cowards tell lies, and those that fear the rod;
The stormy working soul spits lies and froth.
Dare to be true. Nothing can need a lie.

A fault, which needs it most, grows two thereby."

False assumption and false assertion are always supreme folly. It is much easier, safer, and better to be in reality what one aims to appear, than to maintain the appearance of being what he is not. The first great requisite, in every noble character, is absolute insincerity. Says Coleridge, “False

hood and disguise are miseries and misery-makers, under whatever strength of sympathy, or desire to prolong happy thoughts in others for their sake or your own only as sympathizing with theirs, it may originate. The pre-eminence of truth over falsehood, even when occasioned by that truth, is as a gentle fountain breathing from forth its air-let into the snow piled over and around it, which it turns into its own substance, and flows with greater murmur; and though it be again arrested, still it is but for a time,—it awaits only the change of the wind to awake and roll onwards its ever increasing stream. falsehood is fire in stubble ;—it likewise turns all the light stuff around it into its own substance for a moment, one crackling, blazing moment,—and then dies; and all its contents are scattered in the wind, without place or evidence of their existence, as viewless as the wind which scatters them."

But

It is greatly to be lamented that the spirit of falsehood often insinuates itself into those who are appointed to be the messengers of truth only. For instance, Ahab had clergy enough around him, such as they were. Four hundred prophets were reserved from appearing at the time of the challenge made by Elijah. They are consulted by Ahab, whose life they destroy by their dissembling. They care not so much about what God requires, as what Ahab would have them say. They saw which way the king's wishes inclined, and they bend their speech accordingly. "Go up, for the Lord shall deliver it into the hands of the king." False teachers are intent only to please. A falsehood which flatters for the hour, is preferred by them above a stern truth which relates to practical piety and eternal peace.

But "truth hath a quiet breast," and true men are calm and faithful in the greatest trials and before the fiercest foes. Josephus records a case in point, the speech of Eleazer before the tyrant Antiochus. Said the intrepid martyr, "Old age has not so impaired my mind, or enfeebled my body, but when religion and duty call upon me, I feel a youthful and vigorous

soul. Does this declaration awaken your resentment? Prepare your instruments of torture, provoke the flames of the furnace to a fiercer rage; nothing shall induce me to save these silver locks, by a violation of the ordinances of my country, and of my God. Thou holy law! from whom I derive my knowledge, I will never desert so excellent a master, Thou prime virtue, temperance! I will never abjure thee. August and sacred priesthood! I will never disgrace thee. I will bear it to my ancestors a pure and unsullied soul, as free from stain, as I stand in this place devoid of fear, amidst the parade of your threatening engines, and implements of martyrdom." Such are the choice spirits of earth, the men who honor God and human nature, the heroical souls who must have been in the great poet's mind when he said,

"Though all the world should crack their duty to you,
And throw it from their soul; though perils did
Abound, as thick as thought could make them, and
Appear in forms more horrid; yet my duty,

As doth a rock against the chiding flood,

Should the approach of this wild river break,
And stand unshaken yours."

Various are the motives that prompt men to treacherous falsehood. In the betrayal of Christ, we have lies acted, suggested, and declared under two of the most common forms; Judas lying for money, and the priests lying for place and power. "A man that beareth false witness against his neighbor is a maul, and a sword, and a sharp arrow." Pity it is that these mauls, swords, and sharp arrows abound even in the church of God. It is not "setting the battle in array against the Philistines, army against army," but brother against brother, denomination against denomination. The Shibboleth of a party, not the standard of the cross, the angry defence of a sectarian dogma, and not the humble exemplification of exalted doctrine, is the watch-word of perpetual crimination and infamous slander.