The Art of Manliness - Manvotionals: Timeless Wisdom and Advice on Living the 7 Manly Virtues (2 page)

Also, you’ll probably notice that our selections come from the annals of Western thought. While we understand and appreciate that all cultures have inspiring views on manliness, we decided to focus on the Western tradition of masculinity for a couple of reasons. First, it narrowed our field of choices, providing us some much-needed focus and making the already incredibly difficult job of narrowing the vast field of potential entries a bit easier. And second, as the book will primarily be read by those living in Western countries, we thought it would be more interesting and engaging to explore the history and meaning of manliness within the culture in which readers have been immersed.

Finally, all the selections were chosen simply on the basis of readability, strength, and wisdom. The selections are long enough to impart profound insight and short enough to remain engaging. Too many anthologies like this one end up gathering dust on the coffee table. This book is not designed to make you feel good simply for purchasing it; it is not an ornamental piece for your bookshelf. It is designed to be read and pondered. Each selection was thoughtfully and carefully chosen to hit you right in the heart and inspire you to be a better man. We challenge you to read at least one selection every morning, allowing yourself to meditate upon it during the day. We promise that if you do this, you will grow as a man and will walk a little taller and be a little better by the time you turn the last page.

CHAPTER ONE
MANLINESS

M
ention the word
manliness
these days and you’ll probably be greeted with snorts and giggles. Many people today associate manliness with cartoonish images of men sitting in their “man caves,” drinking beer and watching the big game. Or, just as likely, they don’t think much about manliness at all, chalking it up to the mere possession of a certain set of anatomy. Whatever image they have in mind when you mention “manliness,” it isn’t usually positive, and it probably has nothing to do with virtue.

But if you search the annals of Western thought, you’ll discover that this shallow conception of manliness is relatively new. For over two thousand years, many of the world’s great thinkers explored and celebrated the subject of manliness, imagining it not as something silly or biologically inherent, but as the culmination of the virtues as expressed in the life of a man. Manliness was considered a virtue in and of itself, the attainment of which had to be actively pursued.

The epic poetry of the ancient Greeks praised the manliness of their heroes while their philosophy linked virtuous manhood to the health and longevity of society. Throughout the eighteenth century, great statesman tied the cultivation of true manliness to the success of emerging experiments in liberty and democracy. And into the early 1900s, writers encouraged men to embrace manliness as the crown of character and virtue.

This nearly two-thousand-year-old tradition of extolling manliness as a necessary and laudatory aspiration came to an end in the mid-twentieth century. Discussion of character and virtue fell out of favor in general, and talking about manliness as a specific virtue disappeared during our cultural experiment with gender neutrality. Praising manliness became verboten; disparaging it did not. And thus manliness became fodder for broad sitcoms and juvenile magazines.

We’d like to bring back the idea of manliness as a real, distinct virtue, a goal which all men should orient their lives toward. The following chapter highlights some of the best writings we’ve found on the topic of manliness itself. The selections, ranging from ancient Greek poetry to passages from nineteenth-century “success manuals,” show that far from being the hazy concept it is seen as today, the definition of true manliness has been clear and consistent for thousands of years.

The selections are designed not only to explain what true, honorable manliness looks like and consists of, but also to resonate on a deeper level, giving you an idea of what manliness
feels
like. We hope that as you read this chapter, you will be inspired to place the ideal of manliness ever before you.

F
ROM
P
USHING TO THE
F
RONT
,
1911
By Orison Swett Marden

Over the door of every profession, every occupation, every calling, the world has a standing advertisement: “Wanted—A Man.”

Wanted, a man who will not lose his individuality in a crowd, a man who has the courage of his convictions, who is not afraid to say “No,” though all the world say “Yes.”

Wanted, a man who is larger than his calling, who considers it a low estimate of his occupation to value it merely as a means of getting a living. Wanted, a man who sees self-development, education and culture, discipline and drill, character and manhood, in his occupation.

Wanted, a man of courage who is not a coward in any part of his nature.

Wanted, a man who is symmetrical, and not one-sided in his development, who has not sent all the energies of his being into one narrow specialty and allowed all the other branches of his life to wither and die.

Wanted, a man who is broad, who does not take half views of things; a man who mixes common sense with his theories, who does not let a college education spoil him for practical, every-day life; a man who prefers substance to show, and one who regards his good name as a priceless treasure.

Wanted, a man “who, no stunted ascetic, is full of life and fire, but whose passions are trained to heed a strong will, the servant of a tender conscience; who has learned to love all beauty, whether of nature or of art, to hate all vileness, and to respect others as himself.”

The world wants a man who is educated all over; whose nerves are brought to their acutest sensibility; whose brain is cultured, keen, incisive, broad; whose hands are deft; whose eyes are alert, sensitive, microscopic; whose heart is tender, magnanimous, true.

The whole world is looking for such a man. Although there are millions out of employment, yet it is almost impossible to find just the right man in almost any department of life, and yet everywhere we see the advertisement: “Wanted—A Man.”

It is a sad sight to see thousands of students graduated every year from our grand institutions whose object is to make stalwart, independent, self-supporting men, turned out into the world saplings instead of stalwart oaks, “memory-glands” instead of brainy men, helpless instead of self-supporting, sickly instead of robust, weak instead of strong, leaning instead of erect. “So many promising youths, and never a finished man!”

The character sympathizes with and unconsciously takes on the nature of the body. A peevish, snarling, ailing man can not develop the vigor and strength of character which is possible to a healthy, robust, cheerful man. There is an inherent love in the human mind for
wholeness,
a demand that man shall come up to the highest standard; and there is an inherent protest or contempt for preventable deficiency. Nature, too, demands that man be ever at the top of his condition.

The first requisite of all education and discipline should be man-timber. Tough timber must come from well grown, sturdy trees. Such wood can be turned into a mast, can be fashioned into a piano or an exquisite carving. But it must become timber first. Time and patience develop the sapling into the tree. So through discipline, education, experience, the sapling child is developed into hardy mental, moral, physical man-timber.

If the youth should start out with the fixed determination that every statement he makes shall be the exact truth; that every promise he makes shall be redeemed to the letter; that every appointment shall be kept with the strictest faithfulness and with full regard for other men’s time; if he should hold his reputation as a priceless treasure, feel that the eyes of the world are upon him, that he must not deviate a hair’s breadth from the truth and right; if he should take such a stand at the outset, he would … come to have almost unlimited credit and the confidence of everybody who knows him.

What are palaces and equipages; what though a man could cover a continent with his title-deeds, or an ocean with his commerce; compared with conscious rectitude, with a face that never turns pale at the accuser’s voice, with a bosom that never throbs with fear of exposure, with a heart that might be turned inside out and disclose no stain of dishonor? To have done no man a wrong; … to walk and live, unseduced, within arm’s length of what is not your own, with nothing between your desire and its gratification but the invisible law of rectitude—
this is to be a man.

F
ROM
M
EDITATIONS
,
C.
170–180
A.D.
By Marcus Aurelius

From my grandfather Verus I learned good morals and the government of my temper.

From the reputation and remembrance of my father, modesty and a manly character.

From my mother, piety and beneficence, and abstinence, not only from evil deeds, but even from evil thoughts; and further, simplicity in my way of living, far removed from the habits of the rich.

From my great-grandfather, not to have frequented public schools, and to have had good teachers at home, and to know that on such things a man should spend liberally.

From my governor, to be neither of the green nor of the blue party at the games in the Circus, nor a partizan either of the Parmularius or the Scutarius at the gladiators’ fights; from him too I learned endurance of labour, and to want little, and to work with my own hands, and not to meddle with other people’s affairs, and not to be ready to listen to slander.

From Diognetus, not to busy myself about trifling things, and not to give credit to what was said by miracle-workers and jugglers about incantations and the driving away of daemons and such things; and not to breed quails for fighting, nor to give myself up passionately to such things; and to endure freedom of speech; and to have become intimate with philosophy; and to have been a hearer, first of Bacchius, then of Tandasis and Marcianus; and to have written dialogues in my youth; and to have desired a plank bed and skin, and whatever else of the kind belongs to the Grecian discipline.