_Charitas congaudet veritati_; and should it then be used in a gross manner, and so as to become offensive and disgusting? The truth of the Christians, according to the description given of it by St. Austin, is more beautiful than the Helen of the Greeks: _Incomparabiliter pulchrior est veritas Christianorum, quam Helena Græcorum_; and should it appear, or be characterised with so brasen a face, that it abashes and stares every body out of countenance? LX. I confess that there are occasions, on which every man is obliged to speak the truth, although his doing it should offend, or be attended with the resentment of those who hear him; but this licence should only be taken in one of the three following instances, the vindication of divine honour, the defence of accused innocence, and the reforming or reclaiming your neighbour; and I suppose this last is the only motive, from which the speakers of bold truths we have just been describing pretend to act; but are they ignorant, that, although it will always be sure to give offence, their manner of attempting this, can never accomplish the reformation they affect to bring about? Nor can it be otherwise, for how can their sour, overbearing, and arrogant behaviour, produce so good an effect? Or how can they expect, according to the scripture phrase, that by sowing thorns, they should hereafter gather a harvest of grapes? SECT. XII. _Tenaciousness or Obstinacy._ LXI. Not less tiresome than those we have just been speaking of, nor less interrupting to the pleasure of conversation, are tenacious or obstinate people. The spirit of contradiction is an infernal spirit, and at the same time so perverse a one, that I very much doubt, whether there has hitherto been a remedy found out for the cure of those who are possessed with it.