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Path: utzoo!sq!msb
From: msb@sq.uucp (Mark Brader)
Date: Sun, 22-Jan-89 18:41:18 EST
Message-ID: <1989Jan22.184118.3069@sq.uucp>
Newsgroups: news.misc
Subject: Benjamin Franklin's advice
Summary: A soft answer turneth away wrath
Reply-To: msb@sq.com (Mark Brader)
Organization: SoftQuad Inc., Toronto


#  I made it a rule to forbear all direct contradictions to the
#  sentiments of others, and all positive assertion of my own.
#  I even forbade myself the use of every word or expression in
#  the language that imported a fixed opinion, such as "certainly",
#  "undoubtedly", etc.   I adopted instead of them "I conceive",
#  "I apprehend", or "I imagine" a thing to be so or so; or
#  "so it appears to me at present".
#
#  When another asserted something that I thought an error, I
#  denied myself the pleasure of contradicting him abruptly,
#  and of showing him immediately some absurdity in his proposition.
#  In answering I began by observing that in certain cases or
#  circumstances his opinion would be right, but in the present
#  case there appeared or semed to me some difference, etc.
#
#  I soon found the advantage of this change in my manner;
#  the conversations I engaged in went on more pleasantly.
#  The modest way in which I proposed my opinions procured them
#  a readier reception and less contradiction.  I had less
#  mortification when I was found to be in the wrong, and I
#  more easily prevailed with others to give up their mistakes
#  and join with me when I happened to be in the right.

				-- Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
I think he's right.

Mark Brader, SoftQuad Inc., Toronto
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