"There
is a delight in the hardy life of the open. There are no words that can
tell the hidden spirit of the wilderness, that can reveal its mystery,
its melancholy and its charm. The nation behaves well if it treats the
natural resources as assets which it must turn over to the next
generation increased; and not impaired in value.
"If we lose
the virile qualities, and sink into a nation of mere hucksters, putting
gain over national honor, and subordinating everything to mere ease of
life, then we shall indeed reach a condition worse than that of the
ancient civilizations in the years of their decay.
"I wish to
preach, not the doctrine of ignoble ease, but the doctrine of the
strenuous life, the life of toil and effort, of labor and strife; to
preach that highest form of success which comes, not to the one who
desires mere easy peace, but to the one who does not shrink from danger,
from hardship, or from bitter toil, and who out of these wins the
splendid ultimate triumph.
"A life of slothful ease, a life of
that peace which springs merely from lack either of desire or of power
to strive after great things, is as little worthy of a nation as of an
individual.
"A mere life of ease is not in the end a very
satisfactory life, and, above all, it is a life which ultimately unfits
those who follow it for serious work in the world. In the last analysis a
healthy state can exist only when the men and women who make it up lead
clean, vigorous, healthy lives; when the children are so trained that
they shall endeavor, not to shirk difficulties, but to overcome them;
not to seek ease, but to know how to wrest triumph from toil and risk.
"Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even
though checkered by failure, than to rank with those poor spirits who
neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in that grey
twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat.
“The things that will destroy America are prosperity at any price . . . , safety first instead of duty first and love of soft living and the get-rich-quick theory of life.”
Theodore Roosevelt
Photo: Aspen trees, rock outcrop and broken-down log cabin; Red Feather, CO; October 25, 2013
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