Don Quixote tells us of courage
from The Ingenious Hidalgo Don Quixote de la Mancha
by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, as translated by John Rutherford
Who can doubt, Don Diego de Miranda sir, that your opinion of me is that I am a man who is both foolish and mad? And it would be no wonder if you did, because it is the only conclusion to be drawn from my deeds. Well, in spite of all that, I should like you to observe that I am not as mad or as foolish as I must have seemed. It is a fine sight to see a gallant knight, in the presence of his king, in the middle of a great square, thrusting his lance with perfect aim at a brave bull. It is a fine sight to see a knight in shining armour entering the lists for merry jousts before the ladies, and it is a fine sight to see all those knights who in military exercises - or rather in exercises that seem military - entertain, cheer, and if it is legitimate to say so, honour monarchs' courts; but it is a far finer sight than all of these to see a knight errant who in deserts, in wildernesses, at crossroads, in woods and in forests goes in search of perilous adventures, bent on bringing them to a happy and successful conclusion, all to win glorious and lasting fame.
It is, I repeat, a finer sight to see a knight errant succouring a widow in some lonely waste than a knight courtier dallying with a damsel in some great city. Every knight has his part to play: let the knight courtier serve the ladies, add lustre to his king's court with his retinue, maintain poor knights at his sumptuous table, organize jousts, celebrate tourneys and show himself to be important, generous, magnificant and, above all, a good Christian, and if he does all this he will be fulfilling his own particular obligations. But the knight errant must search out the remotest corners of the world, make his way into the most complex labyrinths, at every step attempt the impossible, withstand on desolate plains the burning rays of the midsummer sun and in the winter the harsh inclemency of winds and ice; he must not be alarmed by lions, or dismayed by monsters, or daunted by dragons, because seeking these, attacking those and defeating them all is his principal and proper occupation.
Now since it fell to me to be one of the number of knights errant, I cannot fail to tackle anything that seems to me to come within the sphere of my duties, and attacking those lions a moment ago was therefore something that I had to do, even thought I was well aware that it was foolhardy beyond measure, for I know what courage is, a virtue situationed between two extremes, the vices of cowardice and foolhardiness; but it is less reprehensible for the man who is courageous to rise up as far as the extreme of foolhardiness than to sink down to the extreme of cowardice; for just as it is easier for the spendthrift than for the miser to be generous, so it is easier for the foolhardy man than for the coward to become a truly courageous man; and in this matter of undertaking adventures, Don Diego, believe you me, it is better to lose the game through scoring too many points than through scoring too few, because "such and such knight is rash and foolhardy" sounds better in the hearer's ears than "such and such a knight is timid and cowardly".
emphasis ours
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