basest slavery, in order to gain his ends; fawn upon those who
abuse him; and degrade himself by intimacies and familiarities
with undeserving inferiors. A certain degree of generous pride or
self-value is so requisite, that the absence of it in the mind
displeases, after the same manner as the want of a nose, eye, or
any of the most material feature of the face or member of the
body.

[Footnote: The absence of virtue may often be a vice; and that of
the highest kind; as in the instance of ingratitude, as well as
meanness. Where we expect a beauty, the disappointment gives an
uneasy sensation, and produces a real deformity. An abjectness of
character, likewise, is disgustful and contemptible in another
view. Where a man has no sense of value in himself, we are not
likely to have any higher esteem of him. And if the same person,
who crouches to his superiors, is insolent to his inferiors (as
often happens), this contrariety of behaviour, instead of
correcting the former vice, aggravates it extremely by the
addition of a vice still more odious. See Sect. VIII.]

The utility of courage, both to the public and to the person
possessed of it, is an obvious foundation of merit. But to any
one who duly considers of the matter, it will appear that this
quality has a peculiar lustre, which it derives wholly from
itself, and from that noble elevation inseparable from it. Its
figure, drawn by painters and by poets, displays, in each
feature, a sublimity and daring confidence; which catches the
eye, engages the affections, and diffuses, by sympathy, a like
sublimity of sentiment over every spectator.