A brave man is one who admits his fear. Only a fool believes himself invincible.
Courage Quotes
The quotes worth a second look here are the quiet ones. In Dryden’s Amphitryon (1690) a character says he is “whistling to keep myself from being afraid”, which is still a fair description of how most courage works. Samuel Johnson, according to Boswell (1791), said courage is so necessary to virtue that it is respected even when it goes along with vice. Nassim Taleb, in The Bed of Procrustes (2010), has it the other way round from the usual advice: mental clarity is the child of courage, not the reverse. The psychologist Rollo May is the most-quoted modern writer here.
Two of the page’s better-known quotes are flagged as misattributed: the Churchill line about the courage to continue, which has no traceable source (see Success), and a passage on the courage of our questions that is credited to Carl Sagan.
Most quoted on courage:
How sleep the brave who sink to rest
By all their country's wishes blest!
The Schoolboy, with his satchel in his hand,
Whistling aloud to bear his courage up.
True courage scorns
To vent her prowess in a storm of words;
And, to the valiant, actions speak alone.
Without a sign his sword the brave man draws,
And asks no omen but his country's cause.
I dare do all that may become a man:
Who dares do more, is none.
Come one, come all! this rock shall fly
From its firm base as soon as I.
Courage is of the heart by derivation,
And great it is. But fear is of the soul.
Courage is contagious. When a brave man takes a stand, the spines of others are often stiffened.
Muster your wits: stand in your own defence;
Or hide your heads like cowards, and fly hence.