Of the Vice of Backbiting or Detraction

D O not backbite one another, brethren, says the Apostle St. James (iv. 11) ; do not tell stories of one another. Detractors, says St. Paul, are abhorred of God (Rom. i. 30) ; and the Wise Man says also they are the abomination of men (Prov. xxiv. 9). Men abominate talebearers and hold them in great aversion and abhorrence; and though outwardly they laugh and seem to enjoy their company, they at heart think ill of them and beware of them, because what they do to others in their presence, they know they will do to them in presence of others. This were enough to make us fly and abhor this vice, for what greater evil could there be than to be abhorred of God and men? But apart from that, I would wish for the present briefly to declare the gravity and malice of this vice and how easily a man may come to sin mortally on this point, that so we may use our best endeavors to remove ourselves far from so great a danger. Its gravity and malice consists in its blackening and destroying the fame and good name and reputation of your neighbor, which is more precious and valuable than property and material wealth, according to those sayings of the Wise Man: Better is a good name than great riches (Prov. xxii. 1): Have a care of a good name, for it is worth more and will be more lasting than a thousand precious and great treasures (Ecclus. xli. 15). And so the doctors say that detraction is a greater and graver sin than theft, inasmuch as reputation and a good name is more precious and valuable than material goods. And coming to consider in particular when detraction amounts to a mortal sin and when it is only venial, they say what they usually say of all other sins which of their kind are mortal. As theft is of itself a mortal sin, but may be venial by reason of “parvity of matter,” as when one steals an apple or a penny; so detraction of its kind is a mortal sin, but may be no more than venial when it is only a light matter that one brings up against another.

Nevertheless they observe here what has an important bearing on the case, giving us to understand the danger there is in it and the caution that it is necessary to observe over things that appear small. Oftentimes those things are not so small or light as people take them to be. Theologians say that to tell a venial sin of another, as that Jack told a lie, would not be a mortal sin if it were said of seculars, because with them it is a light thing and they do not lose their reputation for that; yet it may be a mortal sin to tell a venial sin or even an imperfection of a religious because that may do more dishonor to him, and injure his good name more, than telling a mortal sin of a secular. It is clear that, if I say of a religious that he is a liar, such a religious loses caste in your eyes more than there in the world a secular of loose life would lose by men’s saying of him that he goes the whole of Lent without fasting or that he is a nightwalker. And it is necessary to observe that this matter of sinning mortally by detracting and speaking ill of another is not measured by what is said of him being a mortal sin or not, but by the esteem and reputation which he loses. We should always proceed on this understanding and take it for a first principle in the matter. Most certainly it is no sin whatever for one to be of Jewish or Moorish lineage, and nevertheless all doctors instance it as a mortal sin to defame a man in either of these two particulars.

In the same manner if I say of a religious that he is imprudent, that he is wanting in common sense (this is the express example which doctors give), that religious loses thereby more of his good name and reputation than a secular would by having a mortal sin told of him; thus there is more danger in this matter than there appears. I take this man for a good religious, steady and sensible; you say, with a twirl of the hand, “Anthony is so-so,” giving it to be understood that he is a man little to be trusted. So saying, you have undone him; he is fallen far from the high opinion that people had of him before. A visitor comes from another house; and if there be any matter of disedification there, that is the first thing that he tells, and begins to characterize one member of that community as haughty, another as obstinate and headstrong, a third as a restless intriguer. These things are no light things; they are apt greatly to tarnish the reputation of a religious. If anyone thinks otherwise, let him look at the matter as applied to himself. If another were to say these things of you and gave you such a character, see how you would feel it. Now this is the rule of charity which we should observe with our brethren.

We above all men, we who aim at perfection, ought to be very far from these doubts and fears: “Did I by what I said do notable injury to my brothers in respect of the esteem and good opinion which the others had of him? Did it amount to a mortal sin or not?” As we say in the matter of the vow of poverty: “Have I cause to put myself in doubt as to whether what I received or gave away without leave amounted to the quantity sufficient for a mortal sin?”

Very often we cannot determine for certain whether it amounted to that or not. Now it is harassing enough to put oneself in that danger; for all that the world can give, one should not put oneself in such doubt. We must proceed with great caution and care in little things, otherwise we shall very easily find ourselves full of scruples and uneasinesses of conscience and doubts about mortal sin. In this matter of talebearing it is even more necessary to be on our guard since we have great inclination thereto, and the light and easy pace at which the tongue goes is also very great. There is this difference between people who aim at perfection and those who do not, that those who aim at perfection make more account of small faults than the others of great ones. This is one of those tests which go a long way to show whether one is in earnest in his efforts after perfection or not.

We read of our blessed Father Ignatius that he ever maintained an extreme silence about the faults of those in the house. If anyone did anything that was not so very edifying, he discovered it to no one but to him who had to remedy it; and then with so much circumspection and reserve and regard for the good name of the offender that, if to reform him it were requisite only for one person to know it, he never would tell two. Hence we should learn how to speak of our brethren. If our Father, being superior and having it in his power to tell and rebuke the faults of those in the house in presence of all in punishment of them, proceeded with so much caution, and that even in regard of faults small and inconsiderable, with how much more reason should we so proceed!

St. Bonaventure gives this rule for speaking of the absent: “You should speak of the absent as you would if he was present; and that which you would not dare to say to his face or within his hearing you should not say behind his back”—Erubescant dicere de absente quod cum caritate non possent dicere coram ipso. Let everyone know that his shoulders are safe with you; and that rule embraces grave matters as also those that appear light, which are what often deceive us, since many times they are not so light as they appear at the moment, as has been said. And so we must not excuse ourselves on that ground, nor by saying that others think nothing of these things, nor by saying that they are public. So our Father taught us, he who never mentioned in his conversations other people’s vices, even though they were public and were the talk of the town, and he wished us to act in the same way. In our mouth let all pass for good, virtuous, and honorable men; and let all the world understand that no man shall lose anything or be less looked up to for anything that we say.

When by chance you have come to know or have heard of any fault, observe what the Wise Man says: Hast thou heard or known of any fault of thy neighbor? Let it die within thee, bury it there; let it end there and go not out: it will not burst thee (Ecclus. xix. 10). The Holy Ghost alludes to those who have taken some venom or poison, and are in great anguish and nausea in their efforts to cast it out, and cannot without taking medicines and oils for that purpose, thinking that they shall burst if they do not cast it out. And the Wise Man there brings two other comparisons to declare the same. As the woman in labor is in great anguish and extremity of pain until she brings forth the child; or as, when they have lodged an arrow or barbed dart in the fleshy part of a bull, the bull never stops or rests until it gets it out, so the fool never stops or rests until he tells someone of the fault that he knows of his neighbor. Let us, then, not be of that number, but of the number of the discreet and wise, who have capacity and breadth of chest ample enough to shut up and bury these things and let them die and end there.

Our Father General Claude Aquaviva, in his “Industriae ad Curandos Animi Morbos,” has a very pertinent chapter on detraction—it is Chapter XVII—and gives there a piece of advice, that, when one has told a story to the disparagement of another, he should not retire to rest till he has first confessed it; for one thing, because it may possibly have amounted to a grievous sin, and easily may have, in which case it is not right for anyone to go to bed with that on his conscience, but we should always go to sleep as if Wwe were going to die; and secondly, though the thing go not so far as that, yet this will serve for a remedy and preservative against your falling into the like fault again. And not only in this particular instance, but in all like cases which carry with them any doubts or stings of conscience, this advice will be profitable, and all the more as coming from our Father General.