Any time you run a command with the field help:1 included, it returns a help message for that command. Doing so will also reset the last error stored on that connection, which means that if you do a write, then run a command's "help" form, then call getLastError, you don't get the error from the write, you get a default write concern response. Given that running "help" on any command is guaranteed to be a read-only operation, we should not reset the last error when it is run.