strong _will_. And even decision of character itself, as MAGINN
remarks, is often confounded with talent. "A bold woman always gets
the name of clever"--among fools--"though her intellect may be of a
humble order, and her knowledge contemptible." Among the vulgar,
especially those of greedy, griping race and blood, the children of
the thief, a robber of the widow and orphan, the scamp of the
syndicate, and soulless "promoter" in South or North America, bold
robbery, or Selfishness without scruple or timidity always appears as
Will. But it is not the whole of the real thing, or real will in
itself. When MUTIUS CAIUS SCAEVOLA thrust his hand into the flames no
one would have greatly admired his endurance if it had been found that
the hand was naturally insensible and felt no pain. Nor would there
have been any plaudits for MARCUS CURTIUS when he leapt into the gulf,
had he been so drunk as not to know what he was about. The will which
depends on unscrupulousness is like the benumbed hand or intoxicated
soul. Quench conscience, as a sense of right and obligation, and you
can, of course, do a great deal from which another would shrink--and
therefore be called "weak-minded" by the fools.

There is another type of person who imposes on the world and on self
as being strong-minded and gifted with Will. It is the imperturbable
cool being, always self-possessed, with little sympathy for emotion.
In most cases such minds result from artificial training, and they
break down in real trials. I do not say that they cannot weather a
storm or a duel, or stand fire, or get through what novelists regard
as superlative stage trials; but, in a moral crisis, the gentleman or
lady whose face is all Corinthian brass is apt like that brass in a
fire to turn pale. These folk get an immense amount of undeserved
admiration as having Will or self-command, when they owe what staying
quality they have (like the preceding class) rather to a lack of good