| Finding the Way |
Chapter 22 |
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It would have been a great deal better if this betrayer of another’s confidence had regarded himself as not knowing the thing which by the grace of his friend had come to know. It would have been better still, of course, if he really never had learned it. He had not right to hear it. He heard it only through the weakness of another. It is unkindness to many people to ask them to be the custodians of secrets which they are not allowed to divulge. It is placing them in a position in which they cannot but suffer. It is subjecting them to a temptation which it is very hard for them to resist. We have no right to lay such a burden on any friend. Beside, if what we tell is something which ought not to be told, we have no right to tell it even to one person.
But when another has been weak and has told us something which we are charged to repeat to no other being in the world, what is our duty? We may say, “Well, if my friend can trust me with this matter, there can be no harm in my trusting another friend with it.” But the failure of another to be true to himself and perfectly honourable will never excuse us for failing in the same way. Our duty can be nothing less than the most sacred keeping of the secret confided to us. It is not ours to divulge to any one. We should consider ourselves as not having heard it at all.
Of course, we cannot work any sort of magic on ourselves by which the bit of knowledge communicated to us shall be literally taken out of our memory and be a lost word to us thenceforward. Some people seem to have memories out of which knowledge once possessed does vanish so completely that it cannot be found again. But usually it is not great secrets which have been whispered into the ear with solemn adjurations, which get lost out of memory. The things people forget most easily are likely to be things of value, important facts, useful information, things they ought to remember. It should be possible, however, to forget in the same way matters which we do not need to remember, which it is better we do not remember.
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