or, what is
more absurd, to be just sins?" "He who says that some lies are just,
must be judged to say no other than that some sins are just, and that
therefore some things are just which are unjust: than which what can
be more absurd?" "Either then we are to eschew lies by right doing,
or to confess them [when guilty of them] by repenting: but not, while
they unhappily abound in our living, to make them more by teaching
also."

In replying to the argument that it would be better to lie concerning
an innocent man whose life was sought by an enemy, or by an unjust
accuser, than to betray him to his death, Augustine said courageously:
"How much braver,... how much more excellent, to say, 'I will neither
betray nor lie.'" "This," he said, "did a former bishop of the Church
of Tagaste, Firmus by name, and even more firm in will. For when he
was asked by command of the emperor, through officers sent by him, for
a man who was taking refuge with him, and whom he kept in hiding with
all possible care, he made answer to their questions, that he could
neither tell a lie nor betray a man; and when he had suffered so many
torments of body (for as yet emperors were not Christians), he stood
firm in his purpose. Thereupon, being brought before the emperor, his
conduct appeared so admirable that he without any difficulty obtained
a pardon for the man whom he was trying to save. What conduct could be
more brave and constant?"[1]

[Footnote 1: See _The Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers_, first series
(Am. ed.), III., 408.]

The treatise "Against Lying" was written by Augustine with special
reference to the practice and teaching of the sect of Priscillianists.
These Christians "affirmed, with some other of the theosophic sects,
that falsehood was allowable for a holy end. Absolute veracity was
only binding between fellow-members of their sect."[1] Hence it was
claimed by some other Christians that it would be fair to shut out
Priscillianists from a right to have only truth spoken to them, since
they would not admit that it is always binding between man and man.
This view of truthfulness as merely a social obligation Augustine
utterly repudiated; as, indeed, must be the case with every one who
reckons lying a sin in and of itself. Augustine considered, in this
treatise, various hypothetical cases, in which the telling of the
truth might result in death to a sick man, while the telling of a
falsehood might save his life. He said frankly: