When we have achieved a sufficient sincerity with ourselves, it does not
follow that we must deliver it to the first-comer. The frankest and
most loyal man has the right to hide from others the greater part of
what he thinks or feels. If it be uncertain whether the truth which you
propose to speak will be understood, do not utter it. It would appear in
others quite different from that which it is in you; and, taking in them
the appearance of a lie, it would do the same harm as a real lie.
Whatever the absolute moralists may say, so soon as one is no longer
among equal consciences, every truth, to produce the effect of truth,
requires focussing; and Jesus Christ Himself was obliged to focus the
greater part of those which He revealed to His disciples, for, had He
been addressing Plato or Seneca instead of speaking to fishers of
Galilee, He would probably have said to them things different from those
which He did say.
It is, therefore, right that we should present to each man only the
truth for which he has room in the hut or the palace which he has built
to admit the truths of his life. But let us, nevertheless, give ten or
twenty times as many truths as we are offered in exchange; for in this,
as in all circumstances, it behoves the more conscient to take the lead.
The reign of instinct begins only when this focussing is no longer
necessary. We then enter the privileged region of confidence and love,
which is like a delightful shore where we meet in our nakedness and
bathe together under the rays of a kindly sun. Until this hour, man had
lived on his guard, like a culprit. He did not yet know that every man
has the right to be what he is; that there is no shame in his mind or in
his heart, any more than in his body. He soon learns, with the feeling
of relief of an acquitted prisoner, that that which he thought it his
duty to conceal is just the most radical portion of the force of life.
He is no longer alone in the mystery of his conscience; and the most
pitiful secrets which he discovers there, far from saddening him as of
yore, cause him to love better the firm and gentle light which two
united hands turn upon it in concert.
All the evil, all the meannesses, all the weaknesses which we thus
disclose in ourselves change their nature so soon as they are disclosed;
"and the greatest fault," as the heroine of a recent drama says, "when
confessed in a loyal kiss, becomes a truth more beautiful than
innocence." More beautiful? I do not know; but younger, more vivid, more
visible, more active and more loving.
In this state, the idea no longer comes to us to hide a secret thought
or a secret sentiment, however vulgar or contemptible. They can no
longer make us blush, seeing that, in owning them, we disown them, we
separate them from ourselves, we prove that they no longer belong to us,
no longer take part in our lives, no longer spring from the active,
voluntary and personal side of our strength, but from the primitive,
formless and enslaved being that affords us an entertainment as amusing
as are all those in which we detect the play of the instinctive powers
of nature. A movement of hatred, of selfishness, of silly vanity, of
envy or disloyalty, when examined in the light of perfect sincerity,
becomes nothing more than an interesting and singular flower. This
sincerity, like fire, purifies all that it embraces. It sterilizes the
dangerous leaven and turns the greatest injustice into an object of
curiosity as harmless as a deadly poison in the glass case of a museum.
Imagine Shylock capable of knowing and confessing his greed: he would
cease to be greedy, and his greed would change its shape and no longer
be odious and hurtful.
For the rest, it is not indispensable that we should correct our
acknowledged faults; for there are faults that are, so to speak,
necessary to our existence and our character. Many of our defects are
the very roots of our good qualities. But the knowledge and admission of
these faults and defects chemically precipitates their venom, which
becomes no more than a salt, lying inactive at the bottom of the heart,
whose innocent crystals we can study at leisure.