Aim at Truth by S. S. Times.

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Dec 30, 1886

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 12, No. 50.

Aim at Truth.

By S. S. Times.

NO DISCUSSION is likely to prove profitable to a disputant whose chief purpose is to prove that his view is the right view. The only proper aim in discussion is the discerning of the truth in the matter at issue. If two persons have this aim in common, they can discuss any question to advantage; for each of them will be readier to see the truth as brought out by his opponent than to seek an answer to his opponent’s arguments. But if each of the two, or if either of the two, has less of a desire to learn whether or not he is in error than he is to prove that his adversary is in error—then his lack of openness of mind toward the truth will only tend to confirm the victory-loving disputant in his preconceived determination of truth. If you have no readiness to revise your own opinions on a given point at issue, never enter into a discussion on that point with a person who has obviously no desire to revise his opinions on the same subject. A discussion would probably be worse than useless to both of you.—S. S. Times.