In what they, wholly invent, forasmuch as there is no contrary impression to jostle their invention there seems to be less danger of tripping; and yet even this by reason it is a vain body and without any hold, is very apt to escape the memory, if it be not well assured.  Of which I had very pleasant experience, at the expense of such as profess only to form and accommodate their speech to the affair they have in hand, or to humour of the great folks to whom they are speaking; for the circumstances to which these men stick not to enslave their faith and conscience being subject to several changes, their language must vary accordingly:  whence it happens that of the same thing they tell one man that it is this, and another that it is that, giving it several colours; which men, if they once come to confer notes, and find out the cheat, what becomes of this fine art?  To which may be added, that they must of necessity very often ridiculously trap themselves; for what memory can be sufficient to retain so many different shapes as they have forged upon one and the same subject?  I have known many in my time very ambitious of the repute of this fine wit; but they do not see that if they have the reputation of it, the effect can no longer be.

In plain truth, lying is an accursed vice.  We are not men, nor have other tie upon one another, but by our word.  If we did but discover the horror and gravity of it, we should pursue it with fire and sword, and more justly than other crimes.  I see that parents commonly, and with indiscretion enough, correct their children for little innocent faults, and torment them for wanton tricks, that have neither impression nor consequence; whereas, in my opinion, lying only, and, which is of something a lower form, obstinacy, are the faults which are to be severely whipped out of them, both in their infancy and in their progress, otherwise they grow up and increase with them; and after a tongue has once got the knack of lying, ’tis not to be imagined how impossible it is to reclaim it whence it comes to pass that we see some, who are otherwise very honest men, so subject and enslaved to this vice.  I have an honest lad to my tailor, whom I never knew guilty of one truth, no, not when it had been to his advantage.  If falsehood had, like truth, but one face only, we should be upon better terms; for we should then take for certain the contrary to what the liar says:  but the reverse of truth has a hundred thousand forms, and a field indefinite, without bound or limit.  The Pythagoreans make good to be certain and finite, and evil, infinite and uncertain.  There are a thousand ways to miss the white, there is only one to hit it.  For my own part, I have this vice in so great horror, that I am not sure I could prevail with my conscience to secure myself from the most manifest and extreme danger by an impudent and solemn lie.  An ancient father says “that a dog we know is better company than a man whose language we do not understand.”