[81]
Now all this requires great personal courage; but1
it calls also for great intellectual ability by reflection
[p. 83]
to anticipate the future, to discover some time in
advance what may happen whether for good or for
ill, and what must be done in any possible event, and
never to be reduced to having to say “I had not
thought of that.”
These are the activities that mark a spirit strong,
high, and self-reliant in its prudence and wisdom.
But to mix rashly in the fray and to fight hand to
hand with the enemy is but a barbarous and brutish
kind of business. Yet when the stress of circumstances demands it, we must gird on the sword and
prefer death to slavery and disgrace.
1 Courage and discretion.
M. Tullius Cicero. De Officiis. With An English Translation. Walter Miller. Cambridge. Harvard University Press; Cambridge, Mass., London, England. 1913.
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