Life’s Infantry
However obscure a man may apparently be, his example to others inevitably shapes the future of his country.
1859
Queen Victoria 1837-1901
However obscure a man may apparently be, his example to others inevitably shapes the future of his country.
1859
Queen Victoria 1837-1901
In his famous ‘Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard’ Thomas Gray lamented that lives of obscure people blossom only to ‘waste their sweetness on the desert air’. Samuel Smiles, by contrast, used a military analogy to argue that the everyday sacrifices made by ordinary people have far-reaching effects on the country.
THOUGH only the generals’ names may be remembered in the history of any great campaign, it has been in a great measure through the individual valour and heroism of the privates that victories have been won.
And life, too, is “a soldiers’ battle,” — men in the ranks having in all times been amongst the greatest of workers. Many are the lives of men unwritten, which have nevertheless as powerfully influenced civilisation and progress as the more fortunate Great whose names are recorded in biography.
Even the humblest person, who sets before his fellows an example of industry, sobriety, and upright honesty of purpose in life, has a present as well as a future influence upon the well-being of his country; for his life and character pass unconsciously into the lives of others, and propagate good example for all time to come.
1. What is the author aiming to achieve in writing this?
2. Note any words, devices or turns of phrase that strike you. How do they help the author communicate his ideas more effectively?
3. What impression does this passage make on you? How might you put that impression into words?
Based on The English Critic (1939) by NL Clay, drawing on The New Criticism: A Lecture Delivered at Columbia University, March 9, 1910, by J. E. Spingarn, Professor of Comparative Literature in Columbia University, USA.
Suggest answers to this question. See if you can limit one answer to exactly seven words.
In Smiles’s opinion, who should get the credit for most military victories?
Ordinary soldiers, rather than their famous commanders.
Express the ideas below in a single sentence, using different words as much as possible. Do not be satisfied with the first answer you think of; think of several, and choose the best.
Great victories are won by valour. It comes mainly from the ranks. The Generals become famous.