Great Man Series - Theodore Roosevelt #4
This is the last essay in the Theodore Roosevelt series. We have looked at what Theodore Roosevelt taught us about responsibility. We looked at what he could teach us about leadership and we learned from the man who launched him into the world what it means to be a great father.
There is much that we can learn from the life and character of the 26th President of the United States. If there was one idea that tied together the entirety of Theodore Roosevelt’s philosophy of life, the way he led, the responsibility he felt he had, the struggles he overcame, it is found in the words of “The Strenuous Life.”
Many people know his speech “The Man in the Arena.” It’s one of the most memorable and inspiring speeches that’s ever been given. But his greatest speech, at least in this author’s opinion, was given in Chicago in 1899, just before he became the Vice President. He titled it “The Strenuous Life.” Without the Strenuous Life, you and I will never enter into the Arena.
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The Strenuous Life
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 man who desires mere easy peace, but to the man who does not shrink from danger, from hardship, or from bitter toil, and who out of these wins the splendid ultimate triumph.
40 years after the Civil War, America was sitting in a prosperous time that would peak during the 1920s. He was watching the moral decay within society that prosperity seems to bring. Being raised in a prosperous family, his father instilled in him a sense that prosperity was not for individual comfort and it did not give license for anyone to be lazy. Instead it provided opportunity to pursue noble tasks.
But as he surveyed the land, traveling from New York to the Dakotas to the South and all over the United States, what he was witnessing was a life of ignoble ease plaguing the nation. Prosperity had made men lazy, forgetful of their morals, and shirking all forms of duty and obligation. To these men he said:
But if he treats this period of freedom from the need of actual labor as a period not of preparation, but of mere enjoyment, he shows that he is simply a cumberer of the earth’s surface, and he surely unfits himself to hold his own with his fellows if the need to do so should again arise.
What makes this speech strike at the heart of man is that it ties the fate of the lazy individual to the fate of the nation. A nation full of lazy individuals who seek ignoble ease and comfort as the highest good is bound to create a nation of ignoble ease, of moral slack, and of pure hedonism.
Ignoble Ease is Deadly
Theodore Roosevelt took it upon himself to urge the men of the nation to not let themselves fall into the ease prosperity brings. Instead, he urged, put yourself forward for good work, even if it was non-moneyed work. Work in the arts or politics, service, the military, or in charitable service. Whatever you do, do not spend all of your time in idleness.
“We have nothing in this life save by effort.”
“Toil, strive, put yourself forward in the world and do something.”
For Theodore Roosevelt, it was less about what a man did as long as he did something noble and good. He was taught from an early age that idleness was the improper use of leisure. If a man were afforded leisure, it should be utilized for some good purpose, not for fiddling around.
In 2026, America, we are experiencing on a massive scale a life of ignoble ease amongst our abundant prosperity. Yes, everything is expensive, and wages feel low compared to the cost. But we’re so surrounded by comforts and ease of life with our technology that many of us have forgotten the hard work of the world and what it actually takes: fortitude, courage, long suffering, prudence, effort.
Individual men putting themselves forth in the world to a noble task and doing it with all their strength, alters the landscape we live in. It improves the lives of everyone around us. A man putting himself forward in the hard work of the world has no time for idle scrolling, mobile gambling, or endless ESPN. It is this straining towards a noble goal to become a good and virtuous man that will change the landscape of the country, your state, your city.
A speech given in 1899 can still ring in our ears and enliven our hearts and put a fire in our chests to go make something good out of our life.
I preach to you, then, my countrymen, that our country calls not for the life of ease but for the life of strenuous endeavor. The twentieth century looms before us big with the fate of many nations. If we stand idly by, if we seek merely swollen, slothful ease and ignoble peace, if we shrink from the hard contests where men must win at hazard of their lives and at the risk of all they hold dear, then the bolder and stronger peoples will pass us by, and will win for themselves the domination of the world. Let us therefore boldly face the life of strife, resolute to do our duty well and manfully; resolute to uphold righteousness by deed and by word; resolute to be both honest and brave, to serve high ideals, yet to use practical methods. Above all, let us shrink from no strife, moral or physical, within or without the nation, provided we are certain that the strife is justified, for it is only through strife, through hard and dangerous endeavor, that we shall ultimately win the goal of true national greatness.
You can read the rest of the series by clicking the links below
Manhood is Responsibility - What Theodore Roosevelt teaches us about responsibility.
Theodore Roosevelt on Leadership - What does America’s 26th President Teach us About Leadership
Greatheart: The Other Theodore - The Father Who Launched the 26th President
Good post son. These are the things that I tried to live in front of you boys as you were growing up and into manhood yourselves. We definitely need TR around us today.