" [2]
In the excitement of the struggle, moreover, he will suffer comparatively
little from wounds and blows which would otherwise cause intense
suffering.
It is well to weigh scrupulously the object in view, to run as little risk
as may be, to count the cost with care.
But when the mind is once made up, there must be no looking back, you must
spare yourself no labor, nor shrink from danger.
"He either fears his fate too much
Or his deserts are small,
That dares not put it to the touch
To gain or lose it all." [3]
Glory, says Renan, "is after all the thing which has the best chance of
not being altogether vanity." But what is glory?
Marcus Aurelius observes that "a spider is proud when it has caught a fly,
a man when he has caught a hare, another when he has taken a little fish
in a net, another when he has taken wild boars, another when he has taken
bears, and another when he has taken Sarmatians;" [4] but this, if from
one point of view it shows the vanity of fame, also encourages us with the
evidence that every one may succeed if his objects are but reasonable.
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