Be Wary How Ye Judge

It is high tribute to say of any man that he is just in all his judgments. And it is higher tribute to be able to say that he is generous as well as just in judgment. Ungenerous judgment is an unfortunate character fault. And yet perhaps there is nothing men do quite so much as misjudge other men. Robert G. Ingersoll offered this observation: “We must remember that we have to make judges out of men, and that by being made judges their prejudices are not diminished and their intelligence is not increased.” It is perhaps true that most of us let personalities or prejudices enter into our judgment. “No one is ever innocent,” wrote an ancient Roman “when his opponent is the judge”⎯and perhaps no one is ever innocent when an ungenerous person is his judge. There isn’t anything that anyone could do that couldn’t be misjudged by one who wanted to find fault. There is no act or gesture that could not be misinterpreted. There is no uttered word to which someone could not give a different meaning from what was intended. No sentence is ever written that could not be read in different ways. In other words, either we can decide to see the best side of a man or we can decide to see his worst side⎯and we see the side we want to see. “Tis with our judgments as our watches:” wrote Alexander Pope, “none go just alike, yet each believes his own.” This is inevitable so long as people are imperfect⎯and that seems likely to be for a long time. The fervent petition of Solomon is urgently upon us: “Give therefore thy servant an understanding heart… that I may discern between good and bad: for who is able to judge…?” Whether it be among our friends or family, among our own intimate associates of absolute strangers, one of the greatest qualities of character is to be just and generous in judgment. “O mortal men, be wary how ye judge.”