Honesty and Dishonesty

Now I come to the great thing that so much troubles my conscience, more than anything that ever I did or said in my whole life. And that is, the setting abroad of writings contrary to the truth; which now here I renounce and refuse as things written with my hand contrary to the truth that I thought in my heart, and written for fear of death and to save my life if it might be. And that is, all such bills and papers that I have written or signed with my hand since my degradation; wherein I have written many things untrue. And since my hand offended, writing contrary to my heart, my hand shall therefore first be punished; for, may I come to the fire, it shall be first burned.

He is truly wise who hates iniquity, who speaks the truth, and works the works of justice; and he that leads a sober and chaste life, who is pious, humble and devout, and who shuns the perilous rocks of temptation, possesses true wisdom, and the favor of God and of men. His conscience is pure—sorrow assails him not. Peace is his possession, and God often pours into his breast consolations that the world can neither know nor relish.

Go down into your hearts and take the keys of them and ransack your private cupboards, and narrowly observe what junkets your souls have until now lived upon, and gone behind the door and there secretly and stoutly have made a meal of them. Delights are secret things, as treasures are. As dogs … have bones they hide, and secretly steal forth to gnaw upon, so men have sins they hide under their tongues as sweet bits.