That We Should Not Lend Our Ears to Detractions

THE blessed St. Bernard says: “Not only ought we to ‘= beware of saying what is objectionable, but also of giving ear to it, since a willing listener provokes the speaker, and also because it is a shameful and unseemly thing to give ear to matters evil and unseemly.” The glorious St. Basil, speaking of the punishment to be meted out to the detractor and to him who listens to the detraction, says that both are to be isolated from the community. He gives them equal punishment, because if the one did not willingly listen, neither would the other find any attraction to tell the scandalous story.

Theologians on this matter of detraction raise the question whether in detraction hearer sins mortally as well as speaker. And they put some cases in which they answer in the affirmative, as when the hearer is the cause of the other’s speaking ill of his neighbor, moving him thereto or asking questions about it; or when he welcomes the detraction because he is not on good terms with the party in question; or when he sees that the detraction is doing notable damage to his neighbor and could break it off ; because then charity obliges him to help his neighbor in this necessity. Thus, as not only he does evil who sets fire to a house, but he also who stands warming himself at the fire which the other has kindled, where he ought to come to the rescue with water to put it out; so not only he sins who acts the detractor, but he also who could and ought to stop the detraction and does not, nay, even perhaps by the look of interest that he shows gives occasion to the detractor to go on with the detraction. At other times they say that it will be only a venial sin not to resist, as one dares not say anything or meddle in the matter out of some feeling of Shyness on account of the speakers’ being persons of authority. Here they notice a thing which much concerns us religious. It is that, when he who hears the detraction is a person who has authority over them that are speaking, such a one is more strictly bound to resist and stand up for the honor of his neighbor; and the more so, the greater his authority. This is what the theologians say.

Hence we may gather how we ought to behave when we find ourselves in such conversations, and the danger there may be in dissembling and being silent and letting the matter pass, through our pusillanimity and want of mortification. And since for our sins so common is this habit of detraction in our day that people in the world can hardly carry On a conversation without discussing other people’s lives, and we have so much dealing with them, scruples fail not to offer themselves in this matter. “Could I have stopped it and did not stop it? WasTIin any way the occasion of that conversation’s being carried on? Did I ask any question or show interest in hearing it, putting on a pleasant countenance at what was said or condescending to it?” And scruples apart—because here one may say that he knows very well how far to go, and when it is a sin and when not—let us always go on this principle, that we are Speaking now to religious, and persons who aim at virtue and perfection, and want not merely to keep out of sin, mortal and venial, but ever to do the better thing, the more edifying thing, the thing that will be of greater profit to our neighbor. This being supposed, if ever we find ourselves in a conversation where detraction is going on, and we are silent out of pure shyness, pusillanimity, and lack of mortification, and let the matter pass and consent to it, since silence gives consent, what impression are they to gather but to confirm themselves more in what they are doing, seeing that a learned religious and servant of God, a man of authority among them, lets the matter pass and says nothing? They will say: “This can’t be a sin, since the father is silent.” And if they thought it were a sin, and did it before your face, they would do dishonor to you and your order, daring to say in your presence what is evil and sinful, and you not daring to contradict, not having virtue and fortitude enough for that.

St. Augustine, to meet this pest of detraction, had written in his dining room these verses:

Quisquis amat dictis absentum rodere vitam, Hanc mensam vetitam noverit esse sibi.

Hence, hence be gone, detracting tongue, That dost the absent’s honor wrong! This table only those admits Who innocentiy use their wits.

And it is told how once, when some bishops, friends of his, were dining with him and were beginning to let their tongues loose and speak ill of other people’s lives, he rebuked them forthwith and said that if they did not cease their evil speech, he must either erase those verses or rise from the table. That is the saying of a man of courage: “Sir, I shall leave the company unless you stop talking scandal.” St. Jerome says the same: “If you hear a detractor, fly from him as from a serpent and leave him.” “But oh, how he will be hurt!” “Do it all the more on that account,” says St. Jerome, “that the hurt may teach him to hold his tongue about other people’s lives.” Leave him, then, with the word stuck in his mouth, that he may be ashamed of himself and learn how to speak becomingly another time. This is a good plan for us to adopt, either to bid them stop talking scandal or leave the company. When this plan cannot be carried out, as seeming rude or incompatible with the high credit of the speakers, the saints give another plan, easier and gentler, which is to show a severe countenance at what is said, so as to give the speaker to understand: “That language does not seem to me right, and I don’t like to hear it.” This plan is given us by the Holy Spirit through the Wise Man. The north wind scatters the rain clouds, and a severe look the detracting tongue (Prov xxv. 23). And in another place: Hedge thine ears with thorns, when thou hearest a detractor (Ecclus. xxviii. 28). These are the thorns with which we are to hedge our ears—this unpleasant look, this frown and gloom which you show in your face when another takes to backbiting, are the thorns that prick the speaker and make him feel compunction and bethink himself that he is doing wrong in speaking of the lives of others. The Wise Man is not satisfied that you should stop your ears with cotton, or any other soft material, but with thorns, that not only the evil speech may not gain entrance there and you be pleased at hearing it, but that they may prick the heart and conscience of the detractor, and he may correct and amend himself: By severity and gravity in the look of the face the soul of him that is sinning is corrected (Eccles. vii. 4), and thereby he comes to understand and bethink himself that he is doing wrong. We read of our blessed Father Ignatius that he made frequent use of this expedient. It happened sometimes, when Ours were in his company, that someone thoughtlessly let drop a word that did not seem to our Father much to the point or well said, and at once he drew himself up and put on an air that was somewhat severe, so that from the mere look of him the fathers knew that there had been a fault, and the person whose thoughtlessness was to blame stood abashed and corrected. This he did often in things that seemed very slight and trivial, the fault of which, for being so small, escaped the sight of others and was overlooked by them; for he was not content with being always composed and master of himself, but wished his sons to be so too.

It is also a good expedient in this case to change the conversation and bring in other topics to cut the thread of what is being discussed. And to this end it is not necessary to wait for many opportunities or to come in quite @ propos; rather it is most @ propos to come in quite mal a propos, for so the speaker will understand, and the company, that they were not on a good subject, and that you did him honor in not rebuking him more clearly and putting him to shame before all; whereas if you hold back, waiting for favorable conjunctures and apt opportunities and the end of the conversation, neither would he understand the device nor you remedy the mischief. As when in a bullfight the bull makes for a man, they throw him a cloak that he may get entangled in that and leave the man; so, when one person is making for another and taking away his character, it is a very good expedient to throw him a cloak in the shape of another subject of conversation, that he may get involved in that and stop backbiting. And as to the man who threw the cloak the credit of having saved a life is gratefully given, so to him who changed the subject and stopped the backbiting credit is allowed and is due for the honor and good name that he has defended.