As to demerit, it is in proportion to the gravity of duties, and the facility of accomplishing them. The more important a matter, and the easier to fulfil, the more is one culpable in failing to fulfil it. According to these principles, one may determine as follows the estimation of moral actions: Human actions, we have said, are divided into two classes: the good and the bad. It is a question among the moralists to determine whether there are any that are to be called _indifferent_. Among the good actions, some are _beautiful_, _heroic_, _sublime_; others, _proper_, _right_, and _honest_; among the bad, some are simply _censurable_, others _shameful_, _criminal_, _hideous_; finally, among the indifferent ones, some are agreeable and allowable, others necessary and unavoidable. Let us give some examples by which the different characters of human actions may be well understood. A judge who administers justice without partiality, a merchant who sells his merchandise for no more than it is worth, a debtor who regularly pays his creditor, a soldier punctual at drill, obedient to discipline, and faithful at his post in times of peace or war, a schoolboy doing regularly the task assigned to him, all these persons perform actions good and laudable, but they cannot be called extraordinary. They are approved of, but not admired. To manage one's fortune economically, not to yield too much to the pleasure of the senses, to tell no lies, to neither strike nor wound others, are so many good, right, proper, and estimable actions; but they cannot be called admirable actions. Actions are beautiful in proportion to the difficulty of their performance; when they are extremely difficult and perilous, then we call them heroic and sublime; that is, provided they are good actions, for heroism is unfortunately sometimes allied with wrong. He who, like President de Harlay, can say to a very powerful usurper: "It is a sad thing when the servant is allowed to dismiss the master;" he who can say, like Viscount d'Orthez, who made opposition to Charles IX. after St. Bartholomew, saying: "My soldiers are no executioners;" he who, like Boissy d'Anglas, can firmly and resolutely uphold the rights of an assembly in the face of a sanguinary, violent, and rebellious populace; he who, like Morus or Dubourg, would rather die than sacrifice his trust; he who, like Columbus, can venture upon an unknown ocean, and brave the revolt of a rude and superstitious crew, to obey a generous conviction; he who, like Alexander, confides in friendship enough to receive from the hands of his physician a drink reputed poisoned; any man, in short, who devotes himself for his fellow beings, who, in fire, in water, in the depths of the earth, braves death to save life; who, in order to spread the truth, to remain true and honest, to work in the interests of religion, science, or humanity, will suffer hunger and thirst, poverty, slavery, torture, or death, is a _hero_.