30. Truthfulness

What is truthfulness? It is speaking words
which are totally free from harmful effects.

Even falsehood is of the nature of truth
if it renders good results, free from fault.

Let one not speak as true what he knows to be false,
for his conscience will burn him when he has lied.

One who lives by truth in his own heart
truly lives in the hearts of all people.

Those who speak only truth from the heart
surpass even penitents and philanthropists.

No prestige surpasses the absence of falsehood;
all other virtues flow from it effortlessly.

Not lying, and merely not lying, is beneficial
for those who cannot or will not practice other virtues.

Water is sufficient to cleanse the body,
but truthfulness alone can purify the mind.

Not all lamps give light.
The lamp of not-lying is the learned man's light.

Among all great truths we have ever beheld,
not a single one rivals the goodness of telling the truth.