Book 3
16
(5) Those who face danger in ignorance also appear courageous; and they come very near to those whose bravery rests on a sanguine temperament, though inferior to them inasmuch as they lack self-confidence, which the sanguine possess. Hence the sanguine stand firm for a time; whereas those who have been deceived as to the danger, if they learn or suspect the true state of affairs, take to flight, as the Argives did when they encountered the Lacedaemonians and thought they were Sicyonians.This occurred in the battle at the Long Walls of Corinth, 392 B.C. Lacedaemonian cavalry had dismounted and armed themselves with the shields of the routed Sicyonians, marked Σ (Xen. Hell. 4.4.10).
17
We have now described the characteristics both of the courageous and of those who are thought to be courageous.
1
Courage is displayed with respect to confidence and fear, but not with respect to both equally: it is more particularly displayed in regard to objects of fear; for one who is unperturbed in the presence of terrors and comports himself rightly towards these is courageous in a fuller sense than one who does so in situations that inspire confidence.
2
In fact, as has been said,Cf. 4.4. men are sometimes called courageous for enduring pain. Hence Courage itself is painful; and it is justly praised, because it is harder to endure pain than to abstain from pleasure.
3
Not but what it would appear that the end correspondingCf. 7.6. to the virtue of Courage is really pleasant, only its pleasantness is obscured by the attendant circumstances. This is illustrated by the case of athletic contests: to boxers, for example, their end—the object they box for, the wreath and the honors of victory—is pleasant, but the blows they receive must hurt them, being men of flesh and blood, and all the labor of training is painful; and these painful incidentals are so numerous that the final object, being a small thing, appears not to contain any pleasure at all.
