Is there a maxim of truthfulness ?

The supermaxim of Quality is concerned with the speaker's overall contribution (what is communicated, either explicitly or implicitly), while the first and second maxims of Quality relate only to what is said (i.e. the proposition explicitly expressed). While much attention has been paid in pragmatics to the maxims of Quantity, Relation and Manner, Grice's formulation of the maxims of Quality has generally been taken for granted. In this paper, I will look more closely at their role. Grice saw the first maxim of Quality, which I will call the maxim of truthfulness, as the most important of all the maxims. He says in the William James Lectures: