Modern Age - Fall 2015 - 63

GEORGE WASHINGTON AND THE PATIENCE OF POWER

Looking at this same period, another historian concludes that
"there is something unlikable about the George Washington of
1753-1758 [aged twenty-one to twenty-six]. He seems a trifle raw
and strident, too much on his dignity, too ready to complain, too
nakedly concerned with promotion." Young Washington could
come across as pushy and impertinent, altogether too hungry
for honor and preferment. "He had yet to learn," this biographer
notes, "the wisdom of patience; or rather, he was learning it in a
painful school."8
Although the lesson was hard, Washington knew that patience
was a good habit, one well worth acknowledging and making his
own: "Patience is a noble virtue," he declared, "and, when rightly
exercised, does not fail of its reward."9 And, just as he learned from
experience about the military command of men in the field, so he
learned about the inner command of his own wayward instincts.
Over the decades, as Washington gained experience in leadership, the narrative arc of his character gradually bent down and
away from unalloyed self-assertion; in him the quality of patience
became less strained.

T

he theory of behavior that Washington and his peers knew
and attempted to live by did not view any virtue as natural.
What is natural, they thought, is human beings' self-interested
seeking after their own success and longing for others' acclaim.
People do not give unselfishly of themselves or perform heroically because they are naturally altruistic or fearless in the face
of threats to their lives or social positions. By the same token, a
zeal for acknowledgment of their worth-for honor-is innate,
Washington and his contemporaries believed.
While fortifying their own self-esteem is an activity that
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