But
the popular hero knows right well, that the ground is already mined
under his feet; the first reverse will drag him down into a pit of
obscurity, if not of odium, deep and dark as Abiram's grave. Of all
taskmasters, a Democracy is the most pitilessly irrational; it were
better for an unfaithful or unlucky servant to fall into Pharaoh's
hands, than to lie at the mercy of a free and enlightened, people.
Demagogues, and the crowds they sway, are just as impatient and
impulsive now, as when the mob of the Agora cheered the bellowing of
Cleon; neither is their wrath less clamorous because it has ceased to
lap blood. A Federal chief must be very sanguine or very short sighted,
who, beyond the glare and glitter of his new headquarters, does not mark
the loom of Cynoscephalae. Conceive the worry, of feeling yourself
perpetually on your promotion--of knowing, that by delay you risk the
imputation of cowardice or incapacity, while on the first decisive
action must be periled the supremacy, that all men are so loth to
surrender. The unhappy commander, if a literate, might often think of
Porsena's front rank at the Bridge, when
Those in the rear cried, "Forward,"
Those in the van cried, "Back."
To few minds is allotted such a temperate and steady strength as would
enable a man, thus tried and tempted, to weigh all chances calmly;
determined to strike, only when the time should come; disregarding the
extravagant expectations alike of friend or foe; shrinking no more from
the responsibilities of unavoidable failure, than from any other
personal dangers.
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