Tirukural

CHAPTER 30

Truthfulness

291

What is truthfulness? It is speaking words which are totally free from harmful effects.§

292

Even falsehood is of the nature of truth if it renders good results, free from fault.§

293

Let one not speak as true what he knows to be false, for his conscience will burn him when he has lied.§

294

One who lives by truth in his own heart truly lives in the hearts of all people.§

295

Those who speak only truth from the heart surpass even penitents and philanthropists.§

296

No prestige surpasses the absence of falsehood; all other virtues flow from it effortlessly.§

297

Not lying, and merely not lying, is beneficial for those who cannot or will not practice other virtues.§

298

Water is sufficient to cleanse the body, but truthfulness alone can purify the mind.§

299

Not all lamps give light. The lamp of not-lying is the learned man’s light.§

300

Among all great truths we have ever beheld, not a single one rivals the goodness of telling the truth.§