The Art of Manliness - Manvotionals - Brett McKay [18]
By General Dwight D. Eisenhower
This is the message the Supreme Commander of Europe’s Allied Forces, General Dwight D. Eisenhower, gave the 175,000-member expeditionary force before the landing at Normandy during World War II. On June 5, 1944, the day before the invasion, he went to bid farewell to the Allied paratroopers preparing to take flight towards France. He shook the hands of the men of America’s 101st Airborne division and then climbed to the roof of a headquarters building to watch the C-47s take flight. Aware that the casualty rate for these men had been predicted to reach as high as 75 percent, he saluted the planes as they tore into the sky, tears filling his eyes.
Soldiers, Sailors and Airmen of the Allied Expeditionary Forces!
You are about to embark upon the Great Crusade, toward which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty-loving people everywhere march with you. In company with our brave Allies and brothers-in-arms on other Fronts you will bring about the destruction of the German war machine, the elimination of Nazi tyranny over the oppressed peoples of Europe, and security for ourselves in a free world.
Your task will not be an easy one. Your enemy is well trained, well equipped and battle-hardened. He will fight savagely.
But this is the year 1944! Much has happened since the Nazi triumphs of 1940–41. The United Nations have inflicted upon the Germans great defeats, in open battle, man-to-man. Our air offensive has seriously reduced their strength in the air and their capacity to wage war on the ground. Our Home Fronts have given us an overwhelming superiority in weapons and munitions of war, and placed at our disposal great reserves of trained fighting men. The tide has turned! The free men of the world are marching together to victory!
I have full confidence in your courage, devotion to duty, and skill in battle. We will accept nothing less than full Victory!
Good Luck! And let us all beseech the blessing of Almighty God upon this great and noble undertaking.
“Brave men are vertebrates; they have their softness on the surface and their toughness in the middle. But these modern cowards are all crustaceans; their hardness is all on the cover and their softness is inside.” —G.K. Chesterton
The Courage of His Convictions
FROM THE STRANDED BUGLE, 1905
By Leroy E. Mosher
All men of principle and of steadfastness approve the man who has the courage of his convictions. Such a man necessarily makes enemies; but even an enemy entertains a wholesome respect for the man who honestly differs from him and is not afraid to advocate and defend his views upon all proper occasions.
The men of courage, the men of positive ideas, are the men who make history. Without them there would be no progress. The world would retrograde. Civilization would turn backward. The glorious achievements of the past would be wasted, and the future would hold no promise.
It is easier to drift with the current than to oppose it. Those who go counter to accepted ideas often impose upon themselves a thankless and unpleasant task. They incur the reproaches of unjust critics, the contumely of enemies, and too often the ill will of those who are, or should be, their friends. But these things have little weight with the man who is actuated by deep and abiding convictions. He will do his duty as he sees it at all hazards, and in spite of opposition or adverse criticism, leaving to the future the vindication of his action.
The Charge of the Light Brigade
By Alfred, Lord Tennyson, 1854
This poem was inspired by a charge made by British cavalry against the Russian army during the Crimean War. Due to a miscommunication, a small band of around six hundred cavalrymen rode into a valley surrounded by twenty Russian battalions armed with heavy artillery. While the British cavalry was resoundingly and tragically defeated, and their commanders sharply criticized for the heavy casualties, the bravery of the men who charged into the “valley