I have been greatly delighted with reading Dr. Miller’s book called “Byways and Waysides.” In one of the chapters he tells us the origin of the word “sincere.” It is so interesting that I think some readers of “The Message” may be glad to hear it if they have not already heard it. Now the word “sincere” means “without wax,” a life true through and through, without deception or fraud, or any mere seeming: Sine-without; Cera―wax. He tells us in Rome’s palmy days they lived in fine palaces of marble, and a dishonest workman, if he chipped off a piece of marble, would remedy it by using a cement called wax, an imitation of marble, so that the builders had to insert a clause in their contracts saying the work must be “sine cera.” What a beautiful explanation of the word “sincere.” As Johnson’s Dictionary says, “sincere” means “honest, undissembling, pure of heart, unmingled without hypocrisy.” Yes, let us all be determined to be simply sincere and truthful.
Emily P. Leakey.