n sense. Falstaff was never crushed by adversity: no more was the
English race; it was, like him, too vain and too optimistic, too
materially bounded by its immediate desires. It is not, therefore, wild
to claim him as the gigantic ancestor and kindly inspiration of the
priests, merchants, and soldiers who have conquered and held fields
where never floated the lilies of the French or the castles of the
Portuguese. Too dull to be beaten and too big to be moved, Falstaff was
the Englishman.

3. MUeNCHAUSEN

Exaggeration is a subtle weapon and it must be handled subtly. Handled
without skill it is a boomerang, recoils upon the one who uses it and
makes of him a common liar; under the sway of a master it is a long bow
with which splendid shafts may be driven into human conceit and human
folly. There have been many exaggerators in history and fiction since
the days of Sindbad, and they have not all been successful; some were
too small, dared not stake their reputation upon a large lie; some were
too serious and did not know how to wink at humanity, put it in good
temper and thus earn its tolerance; and some did not believe their own
stories, which was fatal.

For it is one thing to exaggerate and another to exaggerate enough. A
lie must be writ so large as to become invisible; it must stand as the
name of a country upon a map, so much larger than its surroundings as to
escape detection. One may almost in the cause of invention, parallel the
saying of Machiavelli, 'If you make war, spare not your enemy,' and say
'If you lie, let it not be by halves'; let the lie be terrific,
incredible, for it will then cause local anaesthesia of the brain, compel
unreasoning acceptance in the stunned victim. If the exaggerator shrinks
from this course his lie will not pass; it might have passed, and I
venture a paradox, if it had been gigantic enough. The gigantic quality
in lies needs definition; evidently the little 'white' lie is beyond
count, while the lie with a view to a profit, the self-protective lie,
the patriotic lie and the hysterical, vicious lie follow it into
obscurity. One lie alone remains, the splendid, purposeless lie, born of
the joy of life. That is the lie of braggadocio, a shouting, rich thing,
the mischievous, arch thing beloved of Muenchausen. The Baron hardly lied
to impress his friends; he lied to amuse them and amuse himself. To him
a lie was a hurrah and a loud, resonant hurrah, because it was big
enough.