Courage and Endurance [pp. 236-237]

THE LADIES' REPOSITORY
old, and consider in which position of their lives
they appear in their most dignified aspect. Much as
we admire them when they stand up the fearless
advocates of what they believed to be right-great
as they appear when they are striving to pull down
wrong-courageous as they show themselves when
their enthusiasm leads them to brave danger, it is
not then that they most fully enlist our respect and
seem to display their most eminent qualities; but it is
when they are in their enemies' power, when they
are immured in loathsome dungeons, when they are
dragged to the stake or the block, that they attain
their greatest elevation. Truly looked at, there is
always a grandeur in real suffering patiently and
enduringly borne. Not in mere anguish, attended by
complaints and murmurs-that is simply painful,
without being noble; but in torment, met with dignified patience and even cheerfulness. In all the list
of heroic deeds, there is not perhaps a more striking
example than that of the female martyr, Anne
Askew, whose hand an ecclesiastic held in the flame
of a taper till the sinews cracked, in order to try
her courage, and she, supported by an enthusiastic
faith, uttered no cry, moved no muscle, imprecated
no vengeance, but looked her tormentor calmly in
the face, and defied his power; and that of the old
prelate, who, when the fagot was already prepared
for his burning, instead of wailing his fate, and beating his breast, and tearing his hair, went to his death
like a bridegroom to the altar, bidding his companion "be of good cheer," and rejoicing that they
should that day "light up a flame in England that
should never be quenched." By the side of such
instances as these, how small by comparison seem the
deeds of active courage inciting men to rush on death,
and die in the midst of effort!
The courage which is exhibited in war, though
more honored and held in greater estimation by the
mass, in the past as well as the present, is neither the
highest in point of quality, nor the greatest in degree.
There are thousands of men and women whose whole
life has been a struggle, hour by hour, with the intensest misery. Poverty, and the fear of poverty,
has hedged them in, clothed them "as with a garment;" their waking hours all toil, or seeking for toil,
their nightly dreams of want in its thousand shapes;
the fear of death, or worse than that fear, ever before
their eyes-for it is worse than dread of death itself
to have all of life occupied by the thought of how to
live, not comfortably or happily, but miserablypoverty-pinched, hunger-gnawed. Yet how many
are there of these soldiers of the world ever fighting
the up-hill battle of existence, ever striving for a position, and never attaining one, ever decimated by
the artillery of necessity; beaten back, discomfited,
all but hopeless, and despairing, and yet still returning to the charge! How many traversing street after
street in search of a meal, living in bare garrets, plying weary fingers and aching eyes from before cockcrow till after dawn, and then hurrying to the shop
for more work for the next day! How many crowded
by scores into pestiferous rooms, breathing poison!
How many worse still-shelterless, and all but naked!
How many sinking under the pressure of want into
slow-consuming disease, and wasting away amid
paint Courage and Endurance! What is the risk of
battles, now and again, to the hourly risks of such
lives as these? What the headlong rush against the
foe, to the continuous fight with the world and everpressing necessity? What the sharp sword-stroke, or
the swift bullet, or the crushing cannon-ball, letting
out the life in a moment, to vitality wearing away
through years of agony? To bear this, as it often is
borne-borne with constant effort, with never-ending
struggles for a better state-and by those, too, who
have enjoyed the comforts of life, argues a higher
courage and endurance than was ever exhibited on
the "stricken field."
In domestic life, too, particularly among women,
we often see these qualities in their noblest form.
Picture the young wife, taken a blooming girl from
a home of love to found another home, which is to
become almost loveless. Fancy years have passed
away, and the girl to have grown into a matron, with
children around her. The rosy cheek has grown pale
and sallow, the full form lank and withered, the eyes
have sunk backward into their sockets, the mouth,
once all smiles and dimples, rigid in thoughtful grief,
the once smooth skin wrinkled and traced with anxious lines, as though care had thrown its vail over
the countenance. What does all that tell us of endurance which shames that of the soldier! It speaks
of her heart's choice growing indifferent, neglectful,
estranged; of the pretty cottage, with its patch of
green and flowers, exchanged for the one room in the
dirty, thickly inhabited lodging-house of a close alley;
of more mouths clamoring for the less food, and their
cries making sadder music among her heart-strings
than woeful bard ever drew from his harp; of late
tearful vigils-ay, and prayerful, too-watching for
the well-known footstep; of the coming sound being
marked with as much of fear as hope —fear the
watched-for one may come reeking from the gin-shop,
and bring from its glare and revelry into the darkness
and sadness of his home, surly looks, harsh words,
undeserved reproaches, and, perhaps, blows. We
know of some such tales, but there are enough, if
written, to fill whole libraries with the histories of
these women-martyrs, the whole life of each a perpetually recurring sacrifice; and yet, sometimes from
lingering thought of old loves, crumbling memories
of past affection, oftener, perhaps, from love of offspring, they cling to their dark fate as though it were
an Eden bower-a paradise of perfect light and happiness.
The world sets far too much store by courageactive courage, braving apparent and recognized
danger, especially when that courage leads to success-far too little by that patient endurance which
bears so many of its ills, and creates so many of its
joys. It writes the lives of many soldiers and a few
prominent martyrs upon its heart; it glorifies them,
it lavishes upon them respect, admiration, and honor;
it builds monuments to them, so that they may live
after death; but it never knows of, or if it knows,
slights and forgets, the thousands of enduring spirits
who pass through life like angels of good, spreading
melodies around them, as little recognized, because
as ever present, as the hum of the woods, and buries
them beneath the lowly sod, over which rises no
memorial-stone to mark the resting-place of the
truest Courage and Endurance.
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