What is the poet’s advice regarding truthfulness and hatred in the poem ‘If-‘ by Rudyard Kipling?
As the poet advises us, we should not indulge ourselves in lying even if people are telling lies about us. We should always remain truthful to keep ourselves out of any harm.
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Again, if people show their hatred for us, we should still not hate others. We should respect and love people for whatever good qualities they have got. This is how the poet puts it —
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
The poet advises us that at a point in life, others will lie and hate us. They would lie about us and feel hatred for us which we must bear with extreme tolerance because they want to provoke you to become angry and start fighting. We must control our anger.
i. lies
Answer : One should not give in to the temptation of lying even if others lie.
ii. hate
Answer : One should forgive people and not hate them even if he knows that he is being hated.