Prudence is an eminent virtue. I speak of that noble prudence that is the moderation in all things, the foresight, the fitness, that preserve at once from negligence and that rashness which adorns itself with the name of heroism, as cowardice and selfishness sometimes usurp the name of prudence. Heroism, without being premeditated, ought always to be rational. One may be a hero at intervals; but, in every-day life, it is sufficient to be a wise man. We must ourselves hold the reins of our life, and not prepare difficulties for ourselves by carelessness or bravado, nor create for ourselves useless perils. Doubtless we must know how to dare, but still prudence is, if not the principle, at least the rule of courage; for true courage is not a blind transport, it is before all coolness and self possession in danger. Prudence also teaches temperance; it keeps the soul in that state of moderation without which man is incapable of recognizing and practising justice. This is the reason why the ancients said that prudence is the mother and guardian of all the virtues. Prudence is the government of liberty by reason, as imprudence is liberty escaped from reason:--on the one side, order, the legitimate subordination of our faculties to each other; on the other, anarchy and revolt.[233] Veracity is also a great virtue. Falsehood, by breaking the natural alliance between man and truth, deprives him of that which makes his dignity. This is the reason why there is no graver insult than giving the lie, and why the most honored virtues are sincerity and frankness. One may degrade the moral person by wounding it in its instruments. For this reason the body is to man the object of imperative duties. The body may become an obstacle or a means. If you refuse it what sustains and strengthens it, or if you demand too much from it by exciting it beyond measure, you exhaust it, and by abusing it, deprive yourself of it. It is worse still if you pamper it, if you grant every thing to its unbridled desires, if you make yourself its slave. It is being unfaithful to the soul to enfeeble its servant; it is being much more unfaithful to it still, to enslave it to its servant. But it is not enough to respect the moral person, it is necessary to perfect it; it is necessary to labor to return the soul to God better than we received it; and it can become so only by a constant and courageous exercise. Everywhere in nature, all things are spontaneously developed, without willing it, and without knowing it. With man, if the will slumbers, the other faculties degenerate into languor and inertion; or, carried away by the blind impulse of passion, they are precipitated and go astray. It is by the government and education of himself that man is great.