Truth Or Consequences

Having arranged for Ahmed to drive Ayaan Hirsi Ali to the airport, I had time to reflect upon one of her statements. She had indicated that those women who had received death sentences from whatever crazed mullah or imam that had made them were all accused of denying 'The Truth of Islam'. It occurred to me that Christianity had gone through a similar phase in the Middle Ages, where a good auto de fe provided entertainment for all (except, of course, the convicted heretic).

The key word here is 'truth'.

During my Oxford days, I remember an all night, rather wild discussion with my classmates on the nature of truth. A lot was said, from the Churchillian "Truth is so precious she need to be accompanied by a bodyguard of lies" to John Stuart Mill: "It is a piece of idle sentimentality that truth, merely a truth, has any inherent power denied to error of prevailing against the dungeon or the stake." Now my classmates were bright people, and could quote relevant authorities at the drop of a hat. I had had enough, and piped up "It seems to me that Robert Browning has resolved the question once and for all."

"Robert Browning?" said someone. "Simone, you've got to be kidding. When on earth did he ever address anything to do with truth? "

"Hear me out," I said, and began to explain. The argument is a bit protracted, but what follows is the gist of the thing.

Browning had written a number of dramatic monologues that had been well received by the Victorian public. One thinks here of My Last Duchess, Pippa Passes, Andrea del Sarto and the like. Certain critics, however, had taken him to task that all this was 'made-up' stuff, not real, and above all, not true. Wounded in his self-esteem, Browning decided to fight back.

He did this in his (rather savage) extended poem, The Ring and the Book, a work that involves all manner of people and events. The thing encompasses a child bride, an older and rather nasty groom, a disguised priest, a triple murder, four hangings and a beheading. And all of this was FACTUALLY TRUE.

"Finally!" said the critics. "The man has seen the light."

Browning replied, (I paraphrase here a bit) "Idiots! Would it have been any less true if the whole thing were a fiction of my mind?"

That shut everyone up, including my classmates.

And before everyone rushes off to purchase The Collected Works of Robert Browning (a worthy purchase in any event) I leave the last word on this thorny topic to the 16th century writer and philosopher, Francis Bacon. In his essay, Of Truth, Bacon writes "'What is truth?' said jesting Pilate and would not stay for an answer."

Well he wouldn't, would he.