It is true that this distinction is a delicate one, but it is a distinction none the less real on that account. A moral line, like a mathematical line, has length, but neither breadth nor thickness. And the line that separates a justifiable concealment which causes self-deception on the part of those who are not entitled to know the whole truth in the matter, and the deliberate concealment of truth for the specific purpose of deception, is a line that runs all the way up from the foundations to the summit of the universe. This line of distinction is vital to an understanding of the question of the duty of truth-speaking, and of the sin of lying. An effort at right concealment may include truthful statements which are likely, or even sure, to result in false impressions on the mind of the one to whom they are addressed, and who in consequence deceives himself as to the facts, when the purpose of those statements is not the deception of the hearer. A husband may have had a serious misunderstanding with his wife that causes him pain of heart, so that his face gives sign of it as he comes out of the house in the morning. The difficulty which has given him such mental anxiety is one which he ought to conceal. He has no right to disclose it to others. Yet he has no right to speak an untruth for the purpose of concealing that which he ought to conceal. It may be that the mental trouble has already deprived him of sleep, and has intensified his anxiety over a special business matter that awaits his attention down town, and that all this shows in his face. If so, these facts are secondary but very real causes of his troubled look, as he meets a neighbor on leaving his house, who says to him: "You look very much troubled this morning. What's the matter with you?" Now, if he were to say in reply, "Then my looks belie me; for I have no special trouble," he would say what was not true. But he might properly say, "I think it is very likely. I didn't sleep well last night, and I am very tired this morning. And I have work before me to-day that I am not easy about." Those statements being literally true, and being made for the purpose of concealing facts which his questioner has no right to know, their utterance is justifiable, regardless of the workings of the mind of the one who hears them. They are made in order to conceal what is back of them, not in order to deceive one who is entitled to know those primary facts.