Michael P. Maslanka, assistant professor of law, UNT Dallas College of Law.

Shakespeare never blinks in the face of human nature. Ever. Exhibit A: King Lear. Betrayal as standard, sociopathy as constant, cruelty as norm. In short: depravity. The play makes a chilling argument: depravity is our natural state, not an outlier. I rise, albeit with a pronounced wobble, to argue the contrary. Here are three lessons for lawyers from the muck of the plot.

Lesson No. 1: It's OK to Lie

Surprised? Don't be. When the right occasion arises, we need to strategically lie. Here's the cold open of the play: Lear is dividing his kingdom among his three daughters. The two oldest (sociopaths each) heap inauthentic praise upon him. Cordelia is unable: ”I cannot heave / my heart into my mouth.” She will not forfeit integrity for wealth. Lear ominously admonishes “Mind your speech / Lest you mar your fortune.” She does not. The next time they meet, he is on his knees, abused and abandoned by the other daughters, close to death. “if you have poison, I will drink it / I know you do not love me / for your sisters / have as I do remember / done me wrong / you have cause / they have not.” Her choice is to be truthful or to be false. She lies: “No cause. No cause.” Next time you are tempted to tell pristine truth with a client or counsel opposite, know that circumstances sometimes make lying morally acceptable.

Lesson No. 2: The good, the honorable, the decent can be defeated by the bad, the contemptible, and the wicked

Let's stay with Cordelia. After not “minding” her speech, she flees to France with her French royal boyfriend, raises an army, and returns to England to restore her father to power. (That's how she runs into dear old dad again.) The Hollywood pic version: After some setbacks, she is victorious and all is as it should be. The Shakespeare pic version: she is captured and hanged. Cut to the most painful scene in all of Shakespeare: Lear staggers on stage carrying Cordelia, her neck broken, and he howls. No words, only noise. Art teaches us this lesson whether Woody Allen's “Crimes and Misdemeanors” (prominent doctor gets away with the murder of his mistress) or Stanley Kubrick's “Paths of Glory” (lawyer loses court martial and three innocent French soldiers in WWI are executed for cowardice). The point for lawyers: we must learn and accept that evil is rewarded and there is zero we can do about it.

Lesson No. 3: Some humans are pure evil. They lack humanity. They are called sociopaths.

And who first identified sociopaths, if not by name but by type? That's right, Shakespeare. (Perhaps that's why Freud identified him as his greatest influence.) The older sisters fit the bill: No conscience (they will destroy you and your world without remorse), the use of sex to manipulate, their needs are all-consuming, nothing is their fault. The Duke of Albany is married to one sister Gonreil (she orders a character's eyes plucked out). He is slow to catch on to her evil but nails it when he does: “Wisdom and goodness to the vile seem vile; Filths savor but themselves.” Shakespeare scholar Colin McGinn writes in “Shakespeare's Philosophy“: “The vile—the evil—are so saturated in their own wickedness that virtue can only strike them as distasteful … to the evil person goodness is indeed an irritant, something to be shunned.” That's a sociopath to a tee. Lawyers will deal with sociopaths. Beware. (They are beyond redemption's grasp.) Learn more by reading “The Sociopath Next Door“ by Martha Stout.

So, how was my argument to the contrary? I know, not very persuasive. Valuable lessons all but not the Big Lesson of what I hope Shakespeare is driving at. (Because if there is no Big Lesson, then we are left with nihilism.) For his point, we must go to the final words of the play, spoken by the son of the blinded character and stated amid a stage now littered with bodies.

“The weight of this sad time we must obey / Speak what we feel, not what we ought to say / The oldest hath borne most / We that are young / Shall never see so much, nor live so long.” (And you thought the ending of “The Sopranos” was a let down.)

These lines are—though, I now think—the 1600s equivalent of a 2000s concept: “A crisis is a terrible thing to waste.” (Paul Romer, Stanford economist) We learn through painful experience and are better for it because we remember the lesson. (Best practices make for terrible literature and even worse teaching.)

Lear is a better person on his knees than atop his throne. Cordelia is a better person dispensing a healing lie than the unvarnished truth. Albany is a better person for accepting wisdom, albeit belatedly. (The play has many other examples.)

Others follow the Shakespearean construct. Here is the Buddha, “no mud, no lotus.” Here is Frank Maslanka Sr., my dad ( steel worker and B-17 waist gunner) ,”Michael, I graduated from the school of hard knocks. Our school colors were black and blue.” Am I 100 percent sure Lear's lesson was the value of hard earned education? No, not at all. Its lesson might be that we are depraved and there is 0 percent we can do about it. But we get to frame our experiences. Pick your lesson.