being
in almost every instance common soldiers, whose conduct this tribunal
was instituted to control, the consequence is that perjury is almost
as common an offence as drunkenness and plunder, &c.'[21]

In the ordinary civil tribunals of Europe and America a man commonly
feels that, though he is removed far from the immediate presence of
those whose esteem is necessary for him, their eyes are still upon
him, because the statements he may give will find their way to them
through the medium of the press. This he does not feel in the civil
courts of India, nor in the military courts of Europe, or of any
other part of the world, and the man who judges of the veracity of a
whole people from the specimens he may witness in such courts, cannot
judge soundly.

Shaikh Sadi, in his _Gulistan_, has the following tale: 'I have heard
that a prince commanded the execution of a captive who was brought
before him; when the captive, having no hope of life, told the prince
that he disgraced his throne. The prince, not understanding him,
tumed to one of his ministers and asked him what he had said. "He
says," replied the minister, quoting a passage from the Koran, "God
loves those who subdue their passions, forgive injuries, and do good
to his creatures." The prince pitied the poor captive, and
countermanded the orders for the execution. Another minister, who
owed a spite to the one who first spoke, said, "Nothing but truth
should be spoken by such persons as we in the presence of the prince;
the captive spoke abusively and insolently, and you have not
interpreted his words truly". The prince frowned and said, "His false
interpretation pleases me more than thy true one, because his was
given for a good, and thine for a malignant, purpose; and wise men
have said that 'a peace-making lie is better than a factious or anger
exciting truth'."'[22]

He who would too fastidiously condemn this doctrine should think of
the massacre of Thessalonica, and how much better it would have been
for the great Theodosius to have had by his side the peace-making
Ambrose, Archbishop of Milan, than the anger-exciting Rufinus, when
he heard of the offence which that city had committed.[23]

In despotic governments, where lives, characters, and liberties are
every moment at the mercy, not only of the prince but of all his
public officers from the highest to the lowest, the occasions in
which men feel authorized and actually called upon by the common
feel