The scents of right and wrong

How does goodness smell?

What odors does evil put off?

Is it possible that there are actual positive smells when we encounter someone with integrity?

Do our noses wriggle in disgust when a person whose character is tainted by lies and deceit walks by us?

Do we automatically associate a church or courthouse with a pleasing aroma, and strip club or the DMV with malodorous notes?

Do we believe things we think “good”  have an air of perfume, flowers, warm sea air, freshly baked cookies, roses and lavender, a favorite meal or dish, lemon or citrus, petrichor, or a field of grains and wildflowers?

Can we gauge the evil in something when we smell sulfur, vomit or excrement, rancor and rot, mold and decay, spoilt food, body odor, hot refuse, singed skin and hair, or caustic cleaners and chemicals?

Does right smell like fresh coffee; intensely pleasing, robust, and invigorating?

Does wrong smell like ammonia; immensely pungent, stinging, and stomach churning?

As scent is a sense, we may apply a belief that there could be scents of right and wrong.

We may need to readjust this thinking a bit, when realize that a true sense of right and wrong, remains much more subjective.

Humbly yours,

J