[
382a]
said
I; “would a god wish to deceive, or lie, by presenting in either
word or action what is only appearance?” “I don't
know,” said he. “Don't you know,” said I,
“that the veritable lie, if the expression is permissible, is a
thing that all gods and men abhor?” “What do you
mean?” he said. “This,” said I,
“that falsehood in the most vital part of themselves, and about
their most vital concerns, is something that no one willingly accepts, but
it is there above all that everyone fears it.” “I don't
understand yet either.” “That is because you suspect me
of some grand meaning,”
[
382b]
I
said; “but what I mean is, that deception in the soul about
realities, to have been deceived and to be blindly ignorant and to have and
hold the falsehood there, is what all men would least of all accept, and it
is in that case that they loathe it most of all.” “Quite
so,” he said. “But surely it would be most wholly right,
as I was just now saying, to describe this as in very truth
falsehood—ignorance namely in the soul of the man deceived. For
the falsehood in words is a copy
1 of the affection in the soul,
[
382c]
an after-rising image of it and not an altogether
unmixed falsehood. Is not that so?” “By all
means.”
“Essential
falsehood, then, is hated not only by gods but by men.”
“I agree.” “But what of the falsehood in
words, when and for whom is it serviceable so as not to merit abhorrence?
Will it not be against enemies? And when any of those whom we call friends
owing to madness or folly attempts to do some wrong, does it not then become
useful
[
382d]
to avert the evil—as a
medicine? And also in the fables of which we were just now speaking owing to
our ignorance of the truth about antiquity, we liken the false to the true
as far as we may and so make it edifying.
2” “We most certainly
do,” he said. “Tell me, then, on which of these grounds
falsehood would be serviceable to God. Would he because of his ignorance of
antiquity make false likenesses of it?” “An absurd
supposition, that,” he said. “Then there is no lying
poet in God.” “I think not.”
[
382e]
“Well then, would it be through fear
of his enemies that he would lie?” “Far from
it.” “Would it be because of the folly or madness of his
friends?” “Nay, no fool or madman is a friend of
God.” “Then there is no motive for God to
deceive.” “None.” “From every point
of view
3 the divine and the divinity are
free from falsehood.” “By all means.”
“Then God is altogether simple and true in deed and word, and
neither changes himself nor deceives others by visions or words or the
sending of signs