VI. I may be told, that human laws do not attend to deterring by the fear of punishment, people from committing any other crimes, except such as are prejudicial to the public, or injurious to a third person; and that officious or jocose lies, which are those we are discoursing of at present, hurt no body, for if they had been found to be injurious, they would before this, have been classed among, and deemed as pernicious offences. VII. Against this remark, solid as it may appear, I have two very notable replies to make. The first is, that although every officious or jocose lie considered by itself, is injurious to nobody; still, the frequency and impunity with which they are told, have a pernicious effect on the public; for they deprive the generality of mankind of a very valuable benefit. To make my meaning more clearly understood, I must beg every man to contemplate the inconveniencies that would arise from a doubt or distrust, whether whatever is told us be true or false; which distrust is unavoidable, and founded on prudence, if we advert to the frequency with which people lie. Upon hearing any piece of intelligence, in which our wishes, or our conveniencies are interested, we remain in a state of perplexity, whether to believe or disbelieve it; and this perplexity is generally attended with a very disagreeable agitation of the mind, that sets a man at variance as it were with himself, and causes him to halt between two opinions, and to remain in a disagreeable state of suspence, whether to reject as false, or assent to the intelligence he hears as true. Those to whom the rumour that is propagated may be serviceable, either with regard to their communicating it, or on account of the use it may be of to illustrate any thing they have been writing, and are about to publish, are set on the tenters by reason of this uncertainty. They would give any thing to ascertain the reality of a curious event, that was applicable to, and would tend to embellish the subject they had been writing upon, but cannot take a step towards informing themselves, without meeting with a stumbling block in their way. Some affirm the truth of the thing, others deny it; here they tell the story in one way, and there they relate it in another; and all this while, the pen of the author is obliged to stand still, and to continue for a long time in a disagreeable and violent state of suspence.