was not afraid I gradually ceased to be afraid. Most men can have the
same experience if they choose. They will first learn to bear themselves
well in trials which they anticipate and which they school themselves
in advance to meet. After a while the habit will grow on them, and they
will behave well in sudden and unexpected emergencies which come upon
them unawares.

It is of course much pleasanter if one is naturally fearless, and I envy
and respect the men who are naturally fearless. But it is a good
thing to remember that the man who does not enjoy this advantage can
nevertheless stand beside the man who does, and can do his duty with the
like efficiency, if he chooses to. Of course he must not let his
desire take the form merely of a day-dream. Let him dream about being
a fearless man, and the more he dreams the better he will be, always
provided he does his best to realize the dream in practice. He can do
his part honorably and well provided only he sets fearlessness before
himself as an ideal, schools himself to think of danger merely as
something to be faced and overcome, and regards life itself as he should
regard it, not as something to be thrown away, but as a pawn to be
promptly hazarded whenever the hazard is warranted by the larger
interests of the great game in which we are all engaged.



CHAPTER III

PRACTICAL POLITICS

When I left Harvard, I took up the study of law. If I had been
sufficiently fortunate to come under Professor Thayer, of the Harvard