Courage

Courage is almost a contradiction in terms, it means a strong willingness to live taking the form of a readiness to die. "He that will lose his life, the same shall save it," is not a piece of mysticism for saints and heros. It is a piece of everyday advice fors sailors and mountaineers. It might be printed in an Alphine guide or a drill book. The paradox is the whole principle of courage, even of quite earthly or quite brutal courage. A man cut of by the sea may save his life if he will risk it on the precipice. He can only get away from death by continually stepping within an inch of it. A soldier surroundied by his enemies, if he is to cut his wayout, needs to combine a strong desire for living with a strange carelessness about dying. He must not merely cling to live, for then he will be like a corward, and will not escape. He must not merely wait for death, for then he will be a sucidde, and will not escape. He must seek his life in a spirit of furious indifference to it; he must desire life like water and yet drink death like wine.

- G.K Chesterton