"I did not say quite what I
ought to have said. I should have said that when we know a little
about a person, and are used to hearing his name, then we are ready
to think we know all about him. I heard a man the other day--a man
who had never spoken to your father--talk as if he knew all about
him."
"I think I understand," said Davie.
To confess ignorance is to lose respect with the ignorant who would
appear to know. But there is a worse thing than to lose the respect
even of the wise--to deserve to lose it; and that he does who would
gain a respect that does not belong to him. But a confession of
ignorance is a ground of respect with a well-bred child, and even
with many ordinary boys will raise a man's influence: they recognize
his loyalty to the truth. Act-truth is infinitely more than
fact-truth; the love of the truth infinitely beyond the knowledge of
it.
They went out together, and when they had gone the round of the
place outside, Davie would have taken him over the house; but Donal
said they would leave something for another time, and made him lie
down for ten minutes. This the boy thought a great hardship, but
Donal saw that he needed to be taught to rest. Ten times in those
ten minutes he was on the point of jumping up, but Donal found a
word sufficient to restrain him. When the ten minutes were over, he
set him an addition sum.
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