Facts about Lying
Saint Augustine rejected all lying for what were religion-based reasons.
Lying when under oath (in a judicial proceeding or similar legal context), even to achieve some greater good, is itself the crime of perjury, and is subject to criminal penalties.
An Appendix to her book contains excerpts on truth and lying from works by Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, Francis Bacon, Hugo Grotius, Immanuel Kant, Henry Sidgwick, Roy Harrod, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and G. J. Warnock.
From antiquity, lying has often been rejected and even condemned by religious figures, by God or the gods (as people have represented God or the gods), by philosophers, by jurists, and others.
Lying requires correct or accurate knowledge of the truth on the part of the giver, and it also depends on the intent with which the falsehood is given.
German philosopher and ethicist Immanuel Kant also rejected all lying even though lying might lead to good consequences because Kant rejected consequentialism itself.
Bok expresses a great deal of skepticism about supposed justifications for lying, although she does not reject lying entirely.
Lying is telling or writing or otherwise promulgating a false statement or claim with intent to deceive.
Justifications of lying are based on rejecting ethical absolutism or nonconsequentialism and accepting a consequentialist stance.
The most thorough and nuanced philosophical investigation of lying was done by Harvard philosophy professor Sissela Bok in her book Lying: Moral Choice in Public and Private Life (1978).
British theologian-evangelist John Wesley similarly rejected consequentialist justifications of lying on the basis that a lie is a sin and sin cannot be condoned even if it leads to good.