A lie which is half a truth is ever the blackest of lies.
Interpretation
A partial truth can be more deceitful than a complete lie.
This quote implies that misleading information that contains elements of truth can be more dangerous than outright falsehoods. When a lie is presented alongside a truth, it can obscure reality and manipulate perceptions, making it harder for people to discern what is true and what is false. Thus, Tennyson warns against the insidious nature of such 'half-truths' which can corrupt understanding and lead to greater deception.
In practice
During a debate, one might use this quote to emphasize the importance of honesty in arguments.
Twilight and evening bell, And after that the dark! And may there be no sadness of farewell, When I embark; For though from out our bourne of Time and Place The flood may bear me far, I hope to see my Pilot face to face When I have crossed the bar.
How many a father have I seen, A sober man, among his boys, Whose youth was full of foolish noise.
O Love! what hours were thine and mine, In lands of palm and southern pine; In lands of palm, of orange-blossom, Of olive, aloe, and maize and vine!
Earth is dry to the centre,_x000D_ But spring, a new comer,_x000D_ A spring rich and strange,_x000D_ Shall make the winds blow_x000D_ Round and round,_x000D_ Thro' and thro',_x000D_ Here and there,_x000D_ Till the air_x000D_ And the ground_x000D_ Shall be fill'd with life anew.
O love, O fire! once he drew With one long kiss my whole soul through My lips, as sunlight drinketh dew.
But thy strong Hours indignant work’d their wills, And beat me down and marr’d and wasted me, And tho’ they could not end me, left me maim’d To dwell in presence of immortal youth, Immortal age beside immortal youth, And all I was, in ashes. - Tithonus
For even if the Word in His immeasurable essence united with the nature of man into one person, we do not imagine that He was confined therein. Here is something marvellous: the Son of God descended from heaven in such a way that, without leaving heaven, He willed to be borne in the virgin's womb, to go about the earth, and to hang upon the cross; yet He continuously filled the world even as He had done from the beginning.
I think if a physician wrote on a death certificate that old age was the cause of death, he'd be thrown out of the union. There is always some final event, some failure of an organ, some last attack of pneumonia, that finishes off a life. No one dies of old age.
Freedom and Justice are twin sisters.
We humans are obsessed with lights...Perhaps it is our way of hurling the constellations back at the sky.
Who can tell truth from falsehood any more? I say it, and you feel it in your hearts: no man or woman on this big small earth. How should our sages miss the mark of life, and our most skillful players lose the game? your hearts will tell you, as my heart has told me: because all know, and no one understands.
The function of the press in society is to inform, but its role in society is to make money.
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