Yours Sincerely?

Perhaps you have come across this recommended method for making a sculpture of an elephant: You just get a big block of rock, and chip away everything that doesn’t look like an elephant.

More poetically, some great sculptor is said to have explained that the image he wished to create was already sleeping there inside the stone, and it was simply his task to reveal it.

But in either case, unlike other arts such as painting, in which mistakes can easily be corrected by painting over them, the great danger in sculpture is of chipping away too much – a disaster which to the honest artist is irreparable.

But less-than-ethical artisans have found many ways to disguise their blunders. Believe it or not, the word “sincere” derives from Latin words meaning “without wax.” The story is that second-rate sculptors had a trick of concealing defects in their work by filling in or covering up any unwanted holes and flaws, with a liberal application of wax, which, if the colors matched well, could give the appearance of solid stone.

Not many people today realize that in signing letters “Yours sincerely,” they’re metaphorically saying, “Yours without wax.”

But of course, Sincerity is only another word for Honesty, of which our friend Roget, who is never at a loss for words, gives us no fewer than forty variations, including “rectitude,” “estimableness,” and “irreproachability.”

The essential element, however, is TRUTH. But please note that this is not the same as believability. In fact, the essence of a good lie is to be credible. Many of the world’s great hoaxes have enjoyed success because they were based on what seemed to be unimpeachable sources. A classic example is that of the cleverly forged “Hitler Diaries,” first purchased in 1983 for $3.7 million by the German news magazine Stern, and then validated as genuine by the eminent British historian Hugh Trevor-Roper.

In our culture, children are taught very early in life the importance of being truthful. They are told that, of our two greatest presidents, one was deservedly known as “Honest Abe,” and the other, as a child, admitted having chopped down his father’s cherry tree, because “I cannot tell a lie” – (though this story is itself – to put it unkindly – a lie, having been concocted by George Washington’s first biographer, Parson Weems). At school, we learn to chant “Liar! Liar! Pants on fire!” and, in one form or another, we become familiar with the story of the puppet Pinocchio, whose nose grew longer every time he told a lie.

But, despite all the stories and jokes about the valuable talent of being able to fake sincerity – and despite the undoubted truth that much of our entertainment consists of watching actors who are extremely adept at just that form of fakery – still there is such a thing as genuine sincerity, of the kind which engenders Trust, which is usually the first step towards Friendship, which, in the happiest circumstances, leads on to Love. And this, as we know from experience with our own pets, and other domestic animals, can also apply to relations among species. The first requirement in taming a wild animal is getting that creature to trust you.

Unfortunately, when it comes to relations between nations, a different scenario comes into play. “Diplomacy,” as this type of exchange is called, is a game with different rules – and sincerity, so to speak, takes a seat on a back burner. Sir Henry Wotton, a British Parliamentarian of some five centuries ago, is often quoted as saying that “An ambassador is an honest gentleman sent to lie abroad for the good of his country.”

Indeed, diplomacy may be said to embody the essence of insincerity. Where then does one look for true sincerity? “In vino veritas,” said the Romans – literally “truth in wine” – which of course may now be extended to a variety of other substances, even including so-called “truth serums,” though their reliability, along with that of the well-known techniques involving “polygraphs,” a.k.a.” lie detectors,” has been widely questioned, if not totally discredited.

In the end, we come down to the end itself – i.e. to the “deathbed confessions” of people who have nothing more to lose or suffer in this world by revealing long-held secrets, often (as one might expect) of very nasty deeds. As a noted epigrammatist (who shall be nameless) once put it:

“COLD COMFORT: some of the worst things I’ve done have probably been forgotten by everybody – except me.”