The Experience of Clarity

221 Ninety-nine percent of courage is “going through the motions”; that is, it is an acquired habit of resisting, brought about through unceasing squabbles with the mundane.  Real danger is so rare that one cannot justify one’s reaction as the majority of either one’s courage or one’s cowardice.  Ninety-nine percent of real cowardice is thinking the whole thing over again ... and again, because one is bored. A Human Strategy ** The Mechanics of Virtue ** Post-Atheism

62 Only those who are incapable of seeing their own contradictions remain sincere .   If the majority of our species hold that we are naturally sincere, then.... A Human Strategy ** The Mechanics of Virtue ** Post-Atheism

222 Every “What if?”  is a cowardice ... yet as such it is the prerequisite to a genuine courage.  Only then can we shout our personal “Even if!” A Human Strategy ** The Mechanics of Virtue ** Post-Atheism

63 When honesty approaches our critical distance, sincerity emerges in a stout defense of our self-esteem. A Human Strategy ** The Mechanics of Virtue ** Post-Atheism

223 What we need is adequate lighting — courage, that close relative to dull-wittedness.  Cowardice illuminates, without fail, but to the point that we are blinded with this all too brilliant thought ... like the rabbit which stops before oncoming headlights.  Even if we somehow manage to move , we still recoil from an all too lucid conscience afterward, as if it had been a duty to be run over by an oncoming cultural presumption, calling it the “courage to hold our ground.”  To fear is to create an absurd double-bind.  To fear is to victimize oneself with one’s own intelligence, and all the while, appearing as the supreme example of “moral courage . ”   A deeper courage would have made its stand against the word, “Duty.” A Human Strategy ** The Mechanics of Virtue ** Post-Atheism

64 Holding to a single mask throughout all contexts is a mental illness. A Human Strategy ** The Mechanics of Virtue ** Post-Atheism

224 The irony of an effective courage: Can I go around? A Human Strategy ** The Mechanics of Virtue ** Post-Atheism

225 Fearlessness does not necessarily entail courage.  If one is intelligent enough and skilled enough one can often eliminate all cause for fear in a venture.  Courage is of a different sort: it lies in those who refuse to give up their highest goal yet know that this stand is doomed.   A Human Strategy ** The Mechanics of Virtue ** Post-Atheism

226 Am I a coward or am I a hero?  Either badge can be sewn onto my coat.  The permanence of victory is the thing ... and that seems to have less to do with courage than with having the personal force to endure a basic strategy. A Human Strategy ** The Mechanics of Virtue ** Post-Atheism