it is stupidity rather than courage to refuse to recognize danger when it is close upon you.
The line is given to Sherlock Holmes pontificating to Dr. Watson.
One has to take a somewhat bold and dangerous line with this existence: especially as, whatever happens, we are bound to lose it.
It was titillating to brush up against the enigma of mortality, to steal a glimpse across its forbidden frontier. Climbing was a magnificient activity, I firmly believed, not in spite of the inherent perils, but precisely because of them.
Nonviolence does not admit of running away from danger... . Between violence and cowardly flight I can only prefer violence to cowardice.
If we must fall, we should boldly meet the danger. [Lat., Si cadere necesse est, occurendum discrimini.]
The brave man is intelligent; he faces danger because he understands it and is prepared to meet it. The drunkard who runs, in the delirium of intoxication, into a burning house is not brave; he is only stupid. But the clear-eyed hero who makes his way, with every sense alert and every nerve strung, into the hell of flames to rescue some little child, proves his courage.
The adventure is always and everywhere a passage beyond the veil of the known into the unknown; the powers that watch at the boundary are dangerous; to deal with them is risky; yet for anyone with competence and courage the danger fades.
When we are afraid we ought not to occupy ourselves with endeavoring to prove that there is no danger, but in strengthening ourselves to go on in spite of the danger.
The devotion of the greatest is to encounter risk and danger, and play dice for death.
A writer should always bravely face life, risking death and mutilation in order to dethrone an emperor.
Why does soldiers leave the protection of his trench hole in the ground and go forward in the face of shot and shell? It is because of the leader who is in front of him and his comrades who are around him. Comradeship makes a man feel warm and courageous when all his instincts tend to make him cold and afraid.
When you're challenged, you're totally alive and totally dealing with reality, particularly if it could be dangerous. And that excites me!
Life can be like walking on a high wire. Falling seems a tiny misstep away.
If a train is coming at you, closing your eyes won't save you ... but if you look right at it, you at least have a chance to jump.
Early on a difficult climb, especially a solo climb, you’re hyper-aware of the abyss pulling at your back, constantly feeling its call, its immense hunger. To resist takes tremendous conscious effort, you don’t dare let your guard down for an instant. The void puts you on edge, makes your movements tentative and clumsy. But as the climb continues, you grow accustomed to the exposure, you get used to rubbing shoulders with doom, you come to believe in the reliability of your hands and feet and head. You learn to trust your self-control.
Any coward can sit in his home and criticize a pilot for flying into a mountain in a fog. But I would rather, by far, die on a mountainside than in bed. What kind of man would live where there is no daring? And is life so dear that we should blame men for dying in adventure? Is there a better way to die?
Not only do the brave get killed, but the brave have a better chance of it.
Some allow themselves to be overcome by panic, and others charge because they dare not remain at their posts. Some may be found whose courage is strengthened by small perils that prepare them to face greater dangers. Some are daring when facing swords but dread facing bullets; others dread bullets little but fear facing swords a lot.
You are never freer than in that moment when you decide to expose yourself to sniper fire.
If man is not ready to risk his life, where is his dignity?
It'll be dangerous," Nyssa warned him. "Hardship, monsters, terrible suffering. Possibly none of you will come back alive." "Oh." Suddenly Leo didn't look so excited. Then he remembered everyone was watching. "I mean... Oh, cool! Suffering? I love suffering! Let's do this.
You remember that I told you it was safer not to know. But,' he went on, as his hands moved wuth their sure and practiced motion, 'I will tell you just a little, because you were so very brave.' Brave?' Annemarie asked, surprised. 'No, I wasn't. I was very frightened.' You risked your life.' But I didn't even think about that! I was only thinking of-' He interrupted her,smiling. 'That's all that brave means-not thinking about the dangers. Just thinking about what you must do. Of course you were frightened. I was too, today. But you kept your mind on what you had to do. So did I.
The nature of a coward is to avoid death. If such a man courts peril there can be only two reasons. Either he is not a coward at all or there is no danger.
Before putting yourself in peril, it is necessary to foresee and fear it; but when one is there, nothing remains but to despise it.
i will follow it, though i know so well now the deep wounds i might find. for as long as i believe that i am walking the true road, if i am slain, then i die in the knowledge that for a brief time, at least, i was part of somethin bigger. this road has perils and i will surely die on it,but, i am not afraid to die.