ty as they
realise more than ordinary men danger and suffering. On the other hand
it has often been noticed how calmly the callous, semi-torpid
temperament that characterises many of the worst criminals enables them
to meet death upon the gallows.

In courage itself, too, there are many varieties. The courage of the
soldier and the courage of the martyr are not the same, and it by no
means follows that either would possess that of the other. Not a few men
who are capable of leading a forlorn hope, and who never shrink from the
bayonet and the cannon, have shown themselves incapable of bearing the
burden of responsibility, enduring long-continued suspense, taking
decisions which might expose them to censure or unpopularity. The active
courage that encounters and delights in danger is often found in men who
show no courage in bearing suffering, misfortune, or disease. In passive
courage the woman often excels the man as much as in active courage the
man exceeds the woman. Even in active courage familiarity does much;
sympathy and enthusiasm play great and often very various parts, and
curious anomalies may be found. The Teutonic and the Latin races are
probably equally distinguished for their military courage, but there is
a clear difference between them in the nature of that courage and in the
circumstances or conditions under which it is usually most splendidly
displayed. The danger incurred by the gladiator was far greater than
that which was encountered by the soldier, but Tacitus[62] mentions
that when some of the bravest gladiators were employed in the Roman
army they were found wholly inefficient, as they were much less capable
than the ordinary soldiers of military courage.

The circumstances of life are the great school for forming and
strengthening the will, and in the excessive competition and struggle of
modern industrialism this school is not wanting. But in ethical and
educational systems the value of its cultivation is often insufficiently
felt. Yet nothing which is learned in youth is so really valuable as the
power and the habit of self-restraint, of self-sacrifice, of energetic,
continuous and concentrated effort. In the best of us evil tendencies
are always strong and the path of duty is often distasteful. With the
most favourable wind and tide the bark will never arrive at the harbour
if it has ceased to obey the rudder. A weak nature which is naturally
kindly, affectionate and pure, which floats thro