actually in it fall away, while the Brave are quick and sharp in action, but before are quiet and composed.
Well then, as has been said, Courage is a mean state in respect of objects inspiring boldness or fear, in the circumstances which have been stated, and the Brave man chooses his line and withstands danger either because to do so is honourable, or because not to do so is base. But dying to escape from poverty, or the pangs of love, or anything that is simply painful, is the act not of a Brave man but of a coward; because it is mere softness to fly from what is toilsome, and the suicide braves the terrors of death not because it is honourable but to get out of the reach of evil.
VIII
Courage proper is somewhat of the kind I have described, but there are dispositions, differing in five ways, which also bear in common parlance the name of Courage.[1]
We will take first that which bears most resemblance to the true, the Courage of Citizenship, so named because the motives which are thought to actuate the members of a community in braving danger are the penalties and disgrace held out by the laws to cowardice, and the dignities conferred on the Brave; which is thought to be the reason why those are the bravest people among whom cowards are visited with disgrace and the Brave held in honour.
Such is the kind of Courage Homer exhibits in his characters; Diomed and Hector for example. The latter says,
“Polydamas will be the first to fix
Disgrace upon me.”
Diomed again,
“For Hector surely will hereafter say,
Speaking in Troy, Tydides by my hand”—
This I say most nearly resembles the Courage before spoken of, because it arises from virtue, from a feeling of shame, and a desire of what is noble (that is, of honour), and avoidance of disgrace which is base.
- ↑ For true Courage is required, 1. Exact appreciation of danger. 2. A Proper motive for resisting fear. Each of the Spurious kinds will be found to fail in one or other, or both.
