The most dangerous thing about a lie is that a word once uttered can never be obliterated. Someone has said that lying is a worse crime than counterfeiting. There is some hope of following up bad coins until they are all recovered, but an evil word can never be overtaken. The mind of the hearer or reader has been poisoned, and human devices cannot reach in and cleanse it. Lies can never be called back.
The story is told of a woman who was well known as a scandal-monger. She went and confessed to someone else. He gave her a ripe thistle-top and told her to go out and scatter the seeds one by one. She wondered at the instruction, but obeyed. Then she came and announced she’d completed her task. He next told her to go and gather again the scattered seeds. Of course she saw that it was impossible. The man used it as an object-lesson to show the seriousness of the sin of scandalous talk.