Article August 10, 1929 Issue

Conversation

DELLA M. WHITNEY

There is no phase of daily activity that needs greater watching, correcting, and purifying than conversation. The one who undertakes the task of watching his conversation for a single day, eliminating from it all that is valueless, will find that he will be kept busy. Paul writes, "Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers."

Upon testing the quality of our conversation, how much of it do we find is edifying—able to instruct and improve morally and spiritually? We are reminded in Matthew that we shall have to give account for every idle word spoken; and any word which is not constructive or a practical necessity rightly comes under the classification of idle or useless. Since our thinking is the source of our conversation, it is our thinking that first of all needs to be watched. Before we permit it to be expressed in words, every thought should be challenged, to see whether the message it conveys is constructive or harmful.

Conversation is either right or wrong. When we talk with another we either help him or hinder him. Most of us have many times looked back with regret to the time when we have been the mouthpiece of error, and we would fain withdraw some bit of erring conversation, some malicious or unkindly word regarding another, or the rehearsal of error regarding one's self or general conditions and environment.

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Meekness and Might
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