A Lie Never Justifiable

ers in war-time could not be justified in doing what was a sin per se, and what God was by his very nature debarred from authorizing or approving. I could see no way of evading this conclusion, and I determinedly refused to seek release from imprisonment at the cost of a sin against God.

[Footnote 1: Heb. 6: 18]

At this time I had no special familiarity with ethics as a study, and I was unacquainted with the prominence of the question of the "lie of necessity" in that realm of thought. But on my return from army service, with my newly awakened interest in the subject, I came to know how vigorous had been its discussion, and how varied had been the opinions with reference to it, among philosophic thinkers in all the centuries; and I sought to learn for myself what could be known concerning the principles involved in this question, and their practical application to the affairs of human life. And now, after all these years of study and thought, I venture to make my contribution to this ph