On Courage [excerpt]

Mr. Shaw once shocked the readers of a paper called V.C. by contributing to a symposium on “The Bravest Deed I Ever Knew” the opinion that Czogolz, who had just assassinated President McKinley, had shown the qualities that go to the winning of the Victoria Cross in a more conspicuous manner than anyone else he could think of. Indifference to death, the courage to face the fury of a mob alone, absolute self-sacrifice—one dismisses these as callousness in a fearless man of whose action one does not approve. One might as well, however, deny beauty to a woman whose morals one dislikes as courage to a man whose morals one dislikes. Every woman is the better for being beautiful, and every man is the better for being brave. But there are other gifts of wisdom, affection, and truthfulness, without which beauty and courage are the mere graces of animals.