What Cometh Out of a Man

What a man laughs at, may be the measure of his mind.¹ The words he uses may also be the measure of his mind, or even more than his mind⎯his character, his soul, what he is inside. Said the Master of mankind: . . . the things which come out of him, those are they that defile the man.”² “. . . In the name of ‘realism,'” observed one writer, “our playwrights have been subjecting the country to a nauseous overdose of foul language. Granted that there are situations in which a man⎯especially if he lives close to the [lower] level⎯is likely to express his emotions in profanity, [but] the stage has come to employ such language so generally as to rob it of all effect as emphasis, and so unnecessarily as to constitute an offense to many years . . . The name of God has been degraded into a butt for . . . a joke . . . It has been bandied about as a punctuation mark . . . “³ To this, an internationally eminent churchman added: ” . . . the moral fiber of a people tests the strength and endurance of a nation. Morality finds its true source of power in the spiritual contact of each individual with his God . . . Unfortunately, we have suffered . . . from a plague of obscenity, blasphemy, and perjury . . . This we borrow from another eminent observer: “. . .We often hear people excuse themselves for their uncouth manners and offensive language . . . but we ought to imitate the best speakers, and study to convey our ideas to each other in the best and choicest language . . . Let not thy tongue give utterance to the evil that is in thine heart, but command thy tongue give utterance to the evil . . .”⁵ We have no right to befoul the air or water we use, and we have no more right to befoul the moral atmosphere than we have to befoul the physical atmosphere. Paul said it to the Colossians in these seven terse words with exceeding sharpness: “Put . . . filthy communications out of your mouth.”⁶