The quality which distinguishes a
man of action above all others is fearlessness of responsibility; the
possession of sufficient greatness of soul and of moral fibre to seize upon
an opportunity and to make the most thereof when an occasion arises which
has not been foreseen by those in authority over him. But far more often in
the history of the world has it happened that brave and capable leaders
have failed for the lack of the indefinable quality that separated their
sterling merits from that absolute and real supremacy which marks the
first-class man.
How then is it possible to differentiate, to describe where and in what
manner this luck occurs?
Fortunately, this has been done for us in seven words by Seignelay, the
Minister of Marine to Louis Quatorze in 1692. Speaking of Admiral de
Tourville, who defeated the English and Dutch at the Battle of Beachy Head,
July 10th, 1690, Seignelay says of him that he was "poltron de tete mais
pas de coeur." The judgment was just: de Tourville, as recklessly gallant
as any French noble of them all, failed to live up to his responsibilities
two years later at the Battle of La Hogue. Mahan says: "The caution in his
pursuit of the Allies after Beachy Head, though so different in appearance,
came from the same trait which impelled him two years later to lead his
fleet to almost certain destruction at La Hogue because he had the King's
order in his pocket. He was brave enough to do anything, but not strong
enough to bear the heaviest burdens.
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