Of all the problems that beset mankind there is one of which it may safely be said that it confronts every one sooner or later with the necessity of making a choice between two courses. Who is there who at one time or another has not been compelled to deliberate over the respective claims of the way that seemed right but unpopular, and the way that seemed easy because other people were following it? Hardly a problem presents itself to the individual but mass influence attempts to make itself felt, and while human thinking proceeds on the lines it usually does, so long will there be the necessity for safeguarding the individual thought from external aggression so that it may be preserved in the freedom which is its right.
In early experience it seems often as if tremendous courage is needed to follow one's own understanding and to stand firm against the suggestion that others are more able to conceive of what is right, what is pleasurable, or what is noble; for the human mind has a tendency to lean on the understanding of others just as it has a tendency toward the opposite belief that no one else can do things so well. At a later stage issues become more serious and appear more important, but as the responsibility of the individual grows so does the capacity to bear it and it may be taken as a symptom of increasing strength that we are called upon to shoulder heavier burdens than ever before. Like David we grow in stature, and from tending the flocks we pass to the task of facing the armed giant in the field, this giant representing error and discord in all its most exaggerated and impressive and boastful forms.
If ever we are tempted to think we have not experience or courage enough to face a particular crisis, we may rest assured that we are never called upon to assume burdens we cannot really bear and that true courage is always demonstrable. For courage is not the product of a mortal mind supposed to be more effective or more intelligent as time passes; rather is it the product of the consciousness of being in the right. This knowledge is as available for the child as for the adult and is in fact a fruit "of the Spirit." Probing still deeper into the origin of courage, one sees that the consciousness of right is proved through right desire, for how can one admit good as the reality of consciousness without desiring it? To follow this desire and to live in accordance with one's highest sense of right is to found one's courage on a rock that is as enduring as eternity itself, and neither human opinion, human argument, nor human will can prevail against it. Physical force, the last argument of the imperfect human mind, has notoriously failed in history to effect its purposes against conscientious convictions faithfully adhered to.
