270 A Forgotten Maxim 



try. It is true that no nation can be really great 

 unless it is great in peace; in industry, integrity, 

 honesty. Skilled intelligence in civic affairs and 

 industrial enterprises alike; the special ability of the 

 artist, the man of letters, the man of science, and the 

 man of business; the rigid determination to wrong 

 no man, and to stand for righteousness all these 

 are necessary in a great nation. But it is also neces- 

 sary that the nation should have physical no less 

 than moral courage; the capacity to do and dare 

 and die at need, and that grim and steadfast resolu- 

 tion which alone will carry a great people through 

 a great peril. The occasion may come at any instant 

 when 



"T is man's perdition to be safe 

 When for the truth he ought to die." 



All great nations have shown these qualities. 

 The Dutch held but a little corner of Europe. Their 

 industry, thrift, and enterprise in the pursuits of 

 peace and their cultivation of the arts helped to 

 render them great; but these qualities would have 

 been barren had they not been backed by those 

 sterner qualities which rendered them able to wrest 

 their freedom from the cruel strength of Spain, and 

 to guard it against the banded might of England and 

 of France. The merchants and the artists of Hol- 

 land did much for her ; but even more was done by 

 the famished burghers who fought to the death on 

 the walls of Haarlem and Leyden, and the great 

 admirals who led their fleets to victory on the broad 

 and narrow seas. 



