True Manliness

True Manliness by James T. Clark

A false notion of manliness leads boys astray. True manliness is humane. It says, “we who are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak.”

It’s work is to protect those who cannot defend themselves; to stand between the tyrant and the slave, the oppressor and his victim. It is identical in all times with the spirit of chivalry which led the good knights to wander in search of robbers, giants, and tyrannical lords.

Those who oppressed the poor and robbed helpless woman and orphans of their rights. There are no tyrant barons now, but the spirit of tyranny and cruelty is still to be found. The good knight today is he who provides help for the blind, the deaf and dumb, and the insane. Who defends animals from being cruelly treated, rescues little children from bad usage, and seeks to give working woman their rights. He protects all these sufferers from that false manliness which is brutal to weak.

The true knights today are those who organize to prevent cruelty or to enforce laws against those who for a little gain make men drunkards. The giants and dragons today are those cruelties and brutalities which use their power to ill-treat those who are at their mercy.

True manliness is tender and loving.

False manliness, cold and hard, cynical and contemptuous.

The bravest and most heroic souls are usually the most loving. Garibaldi, Kossuth, Mazzini, the heroes of our times; Luther, who never feared the face of man; Gustavus-Adolphus and William of Orange, are examples of this union of courage and tenderness. Bold as lions in the defense of the right, such man in their homes and their private life have a womanly gentleness.

False manliness is unfeeling, with no kindly sympathies, rude and rough and overbearing. True manliness is temperate; it is moderate. It exercises self-control. It is capable of self-denials and renunciation.

False manliness is self-willed and self indulgent.