4. The point to make out is that no lie is told. To speak under a reservation is a lie, if it is speech against the mind of the speaker. But how can it be aught else than speech against the mind, when the heart thinks _yea_, and the tongue says _nay_? We answer that, in the case contemplated, the thought of the heart is, _secrets apart, nay_; and though the word on the lips is _nay_ simply, yet we must not take that word as the whole locution, but as a mere text, to which the situation of the speaker and the matter spoken of form a commentary, legible to any observant eye. The word is an _annotated text; nay_ in the body of the page, with _secrets apart_ inscribed in the margin. The adequate utterance is the whole page, text and gloss together; that speech answers to the thought in the speaker's mind; therefore it is no lie. 5. The essential requisite is that the gloss, _secrets apart_, be not written in the speaker's private mind, but be outwardly and publicly manifest in the matter spoken of, which must be one that clearly admits of secrets, and in the circumstances of the speaker, who is driven into a corner, and obliged to answer something, and yet cannot by any prudent man be expected to answer out of the fulness of all the knowledge that he may possibly possess. 6. Nor let it be said that all confidence in the replies given to our questions is hereby destroyed. For most questions are in matters that do not admit of a secret. There the qualification, _secrets apart_, which may be said to attach to all answers, has no value and meaning: it is mathematically equal to zero; and we may take the answer in full assurance just as it reaches our ear. Again, when a person volunteers a statement unasked, he cannot be supposed to be reserving secrets. But when delicate subjects are touched on, and inquiry is pushed to extremity by an unauthorized questioner, _secrets apart_ is the handwriting on the wall. 7. But why is not this qualification spoken out with the tongue? Sometimes it safely may be, and then it should be so added. But, as the addition is unusual, our taking the trouble to express it would often certify to the inquirer that his suspicions were correct, though we ought not to tell him so. Our aim then must be to give such an oral answer as we should return, were the suspicion quite unfounded. Our questioner, if he is a prudent man, will piece out our phrase with the addition, _secrets apart_; and he will understand that he can get nothing out of us either way, which is exactly what we wish him to understand. His unauthorized interrogatory has been met by speech that amounts to silence, arguing indeed our prudence, but leaving him as wise as before on the forbidden topic. If he is a thoughtless man, he is deceived, not by any intention or election of ours, but indirectly so far as we are concerned, an incidental deception which he has brought on himself.