For I know not to give flattering titles - I do not know how to flatter. It is not in my character; it has not been my habit. “In so doing.” These words are not in the Hebrew, and they greatly mar the sense, and give a different idea from that which was intended by the speaker.
My Maker would soon take me away - Or, rather, “My Maker will soon take me away.” That is, “I know that I must soon be removed, and must stand before my Maker. I must give an account for all that I say. Knowing that I am to go to the realities of another state of being, I cannot flatter people. I must tell them the exact and simple truth.” There could be no better preventive of flattery than this. The conviction that we are soon to appear before God, where all are on a level, and where every mask will be stripped off, and everything appear as it is, would prevent us from ascribing to others qualities which we know they do not possess, and from giving them titles which will only exalt them in their own estimation, and hide the truth from their minds. Titles which properly belong to men, and which pertain to office, religion does not forbid us to confer - for the welfare of the community is promoted by a proper respect for the names and offices of those who rule. But no good end is answered in ascribing to men titles as mere matters of distinction, which serve to keep before them the idea of their own talents or importance; or which lead them to forget that they like others are soon to be “taken away,” and called to give up their account in another world. The deep conviction that we are all soon to try the realities of a bed of death and of the grave, and that we are to go to a world where there is no delusion, and where the ascription of qualities to us here which do not belong to us will be of no avail, would prompt to a wish to state always the simple truth. Under that conviction, we should never so ascribe to another any quality of beauty, strength, or talent, any name or title, as to leave him for one moment under a deception about himself. If this rule were followed, what a change would it produce in the social, the political, the literary, and even the religious world!