Character — Ch 7b - Duty--Truthfulness, cont.

The sense of duty is a sustaining power even to a courageous man.

It holds him upright, and makes him strong.

It was a noble saying of Pompey, when his friends tried to dissuade him from embarking for Rome in a storm, telling him that he did so at the great peril of his life: "It is necessary for me to go," he said; "it is not necessary for me to live."

What it was right that he should do, he would do, in the face of danger and in defiance of storms.

As might be expected of the great Washington, the chief motive power in his life was the spirit of duty.

It was the regal and commanding element in his character which gave it unity, compactness, and vigour.

When he clearly saw his duty before him, he did it at all hazards, and with inflexible integrity.

He did not do it for effect; nor did he think of glory, or of fame and its rewards; but of the right thing to be done, and the best way of doing it.

Yet Washington had a most modest opinion of himself; and when offered the chief command of the American patriot army, he hesitated to accept it until it was pressed upon him.

When acknowledging in Congress the honour which had been done him in selecting him to so important a trust, on the execution of which the future of his country in a great measure depended, Washington said: "I beg it may be remembered, lest some unlucky event should happen unfavourable to my reputation, that I this day declare, with the utmost sincerity, I do not think myself equal to the command I am honoured with."

And in his letter to his wife, communicating to her his appointment as Commander-in-Chief, he said: "I have used every endeavour in my power to avoid it, not only from my unwillingness to part with you and the family, but from a consciousness of its being a trust too great for my capacity; and that I should enjoy more real happiness in one month with you at home, than I have the most distant prospect of finding abroad, if my stay were to be seven times seven years.

But, as it has been a kind of destiny that has thrown me upon this service, I shall hope that my undertaking it is designed for some good purpose.

It was utterly out of my power to refuse the appointment, without exposing my character to such censures as would have reflected dishonour upon myself, and given pain to my friends.

This, I am sure, could not, and ought not, to be pleasing to you, and must have lessened me considerably in my own esteem."

[164] Washington pursued his upright course through life, first as Commander-in-Chief, and afterwards as President, never faltering in the path of duty.

He had no regard for popularity, but held to his purpose, through good and through evil report, often at the risk of his power and influence.

Thus, on one occasion, when the ratification of a treaty, arranged by Mr. Jay with Great Britain, was in question, Washington was urged to reject it.

But his honour, and the honour of his country, was committed, and he refused to do so.

A great outcry was raised against the treaty, and for a time Washington was so unpopular that he is said to have been actually stoned by the mob.

But he, nevertheless, held it to be his duty to ratify the treaty; and it was carried out, in despite of petitions and remonstrances from all quarters.

"While I feel," he said, in answer to the remonstrants, "the most lively gratitude for the many instances of approbation from my country, I can no otherwise deserve it than by obeying the dictates of my conscience."

Wellington's watchword, like Washington's, was duty; and no man could be more loyal to it than he was.

[165] "There is little or nothing," he once said, "in this life worth living for; but we can all of us go straight forward and do our duty."

None recognised more cheerfully than he did the duty of obedience and willing service; for unless men can serve faithfully, they will not rule others wisely.

There is no motto that becomes the wise man better than ICH DIEN, "I serve;" and "They also serve who only stand and wait."

When the mortification of an officer, because of his being appointed to a command inferior to what he considered to be his merits, was communicated to the Duke, he said: "In the course of my military career, I have gone from the command of a brigade to that of my regiment, and from the command of an army to that of a brigade or a division, as I was ordered, and without any feeling of mortification."

Whilst commanding the allied army in Portugal, the conduct of the native population did not seem to Wellington to be either becoming or dutiful.

"We have enthusiasm in plenty," he said, "and plenty of cries of 'VIVA!'

We have illuminations, patriotic songs, and FETES everywhere.

But what we want is, that each in his own station should do his duty faithfully, and pay implicit obedience to legal authority."

This abiding ideal of duty seemed to be the governing principle of Wellington's character.

It was always uppermost in his mind, and directed all the public actions of his life.

Nor did it fail to communicate itself to those under him, who served him in the like spirit.

When he rode into one of his infantry squares at Waterloo, as its diminished numbers closed up to receive a charge of French cavalry, he said to the men, "Stand steady, lads; think of what they will say of us in England;" to which the men replied, "Never fear, sir--we know our duty."

Duty was also the dominant idea in Nelson's mind.

The spirit in which he served his country was expressed in the famous watchword, "England expects every man to do his duty," signalled by him to the fleet before going into action at Trafalgar, as well as in the last words that passed his lips,--"I have done my duty; I praise God for it!"

And Nelson's companion and friend--the brave, sensible, homely-minded Collingwood--he who, as his ship bore down into the great sea-fight, said to his flag-captain, "Just about this time our wives are going to church in England,"--Collingwood too was, like his commander, an ardent devotee of duty.

"Do your duty to the best of your ability," was the maxim which he urged upon many young men starting on the voyage of life.

To a midshipman he once gave the following manly and sensible advice:- "You may depend upon it, that it is more in your own power than in anybody else's to promote both your comfort and advancement.

A strict and unwearied attention to your duty, and a complacent and respectful behaviour, not only to your superiors but to everybody, will ensure you their regard, and the reward will surely come; but if it should not, I am convinced you have too much good sense to let disappointment sour you.

Guard carefully against letting discontent appear in you.

It will be sorrow to your friends, a triumph to your competitors, and cannot be productive of any good.

Conduct yourself so as to deserve the best that can come to you, and the consciousness of your own proper behaviour will keep you in spirits if it should not come.

Let it be your ambition to be foremost in all duty.

Do not be a nice observer of turns, but ever present yourself ready for everything, and, unless your officers are very inattentive men, they will not allow others to impose more duty on you than they should."

This devotion to duty is said to be peculiar to the English nation; and it has certainly more or less characterised our greatest public men.

Probably no commander of any other nation ever went into action with such a signal flying as Nelson at Trafalgar--not "Glory," or "Victory," or "Honour," or "Country"--but simply "Duty!"

How few are the nations willing to rally to such a battle-cry!

Shortly after the wreck of the BIRKENHEAD off the coast of Africa, in which the officers and men went down firing a FEU-DE-JOIE after seeing the women and children safely embarked in the boats,--Robertson of Brighton, referring to the circumstance in one of his letters, said: "Yes!

Goodness, Duty, Sacrifice,--these are the qualities that England honours.

She gapes and wonders every now and then, like an awkward peasant, at some other things--railway kings, electro-biology, and other trumperies; but nothing stirs her grand old heart down to its central deeps universally and long, except the Right.

She puts on her shawl very badly, and she is awkward enough in a concert-room, scarce knowing a Swedish nightingale from a jackdaw; but--blessings large and long upon her!

--she knows how to teach her sons to sink like men amidst sharks and billows, without parade, without display, as if Duty were the most natural thing in the world; and she never mistakes long an actor for a hero, or a hero for an actor."

[166] It is a grand thing, after all, this pervading spirit of Duty in a nation; and so long as it survives, no one need despair of its future.

But when it has departed, or become deadened, and been supplanted by thirst for pleasure, or selfish aggrandisement, or "glory"--then woe to that nation, for its dissolution is near at hand!

If there be one point on which intelligent observers are agreed more than another as to the cause of the late deplorable collapse of France as a nation, it was the utter absence of this feeling of duty, as well as of truthfulness, from the mind, not only of the men, but of the leaders of the French people.

The unprejudiced testimony of Baron Stoffel, French military attache at Berlin, before the war, is conclusive on this point.

In his private report to the Emperor, found at the Tuileries, which was written in August, 1869, about a year before the outbreak of the war, Baron Stoffel pointed out that the highly-educated and disciplined German people were pervaded by an ardent sense of duty, and did not think it beneath them to reverence sincerely what was noble and lofty; whereas, in all respects, France presented a melancholy contrast.

There the people, having sneered at everything, had lost the faculty of respecting anything, and virtue, family life, patriotism, honour, and religion, were represented to a frivolous generation as only fitting subjects for ridicule.

[167] Alas!

how terribly has France been punished for her sins against truth and duty!

Yet the time was, when France possessed many great men inspired by duty; but they were all men of a comparatively remote past.

The race of Bayard, Duguesclin, Coligny, Duquesne, Turenne, Colbert, and Sully, seems to have died out and left no lineage.

There has been an occasional great Frenchman of modern times who has raised the cry of Duty; but his voice has been as that of one crying in the wilderness.

De Tocqueville was one of such; but, like all men of his stamp, he was proscribed, imprisoned, and driven from public life.

Writing on one occasion to his friend Kergorlay, he said: "Like you, I become more and more alive to the happiness which consists in the fulfilment of Duty.

I believe there is no other so deep and so real.

There is only one great object in the world which deserves our efforts, and that is the good of mankind."

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