is a much more prolific source of worry than most people
imagine. There are many varieties of cowardice, all tracing their
ancestry back to fear. Fear truly makes cowards of us all. There are
the physical cowards, the social cowards, the business cowards, the
hang-on-to-your-job cowards, the political cowards, the moral cowards,
the religious cowards, and fifty-seven, nay, a hundred and one other
varieties. Each and all of these have their own attendant demons of
worry. Every barking dog becomes a lion ready to tear one to pieces,
and no bridge is strong enough to allow us to pass over in safety. No
cloud has a silver lining, and every rain-storm is sure to work
injury to the crops rather than bring the needful moisture for their
vivification.

What a piteous sight to see a man who dares not express his honest
opinions, who must crawl instead of walk upright, in the presence of
his employer, lest he lose his job. How his cowardice worries him,
meets him at every turn, torments him, lest some incautious word be
repeated, lest he say or do the wrong thing. And so long as there
are cowards to employ, bully employers will exist. Nay, the cowardice
seems to call out bullying qualities. Just as a cur will follow you
with barkings and threatening growls if you run from him, and yet turn
tail and run when you boldly face him, so with most men, with society,
with the world--flee from them, show your fear of them, and they will
harry you, but boldly face them, they gentle down immediately, fawn
upon you, lie down, or, to use an expressive slang phrase, "come and
eat out of your hand."

How politicians straddle the fence, refrain from expressing their
opinions, deal in glittering generalities, because of their cowardly
fears. How they turn their sails to catch every breath of popular
favor. How cautious, politic, wary, they are, and how fears worry and
besiege them, whenever they accidentally or incidentally say something
that can be interpreted as a positive conviction. And yet men really
love a brave man in political life; one who has definite convictions
and fearlessly states them; who has no worries as to results but dares
to say and do those things only of which his conscience approves. No
matter how one may regard Roosevelt, cowardice is one thing none will
accuse him of. He says his say, does his will, expresses himself with
freedom upon any and all subjects, let results be as they may. Such
a man is free from the petty w