A Gentleman

When I was a boy of about twelve years I began to be interested in car racing.  I looked forward each Memorial Day to hearing the announcer of the Indianapolis 500 car race say, ‘Gentlemen, start your engines!’  It was not just the thrill of speed that I looked forward to, but it was envisioning these brave heroes in the powerful cars they controlled with such precision. And I believed, without confirming evidence, that they were all ‘gentlemen.’ 

 

It was also at this time and a little later in my youth other heroes were identified in my mind—Ted Williams in baseball, war heroes, presidents such as Abraham Lincoln and noble statesmen such as Winston Churchill, explorers such as Lewis and Clark, and Bible heroes such as Joshua.  Invariably in my mind I invested them with qualities that I considered manly, especially ‘gentlemanly.’ 

 

In time I became more discriminatory as to who should receive the noble title of ‘gentleman.’  Fortunately many (but not all) of my early assessments proved to be correct.  It was with increasingly wider reading and exposure to numerous living men in scouting, athletics, schooling and Church I became acquainted with the men who met the criteria and men who didn’t.  Let me share with the reader a few of the virtues I believe a gentleman has and some observations of others who helped me crystallize my opinions:

A gentleman has respectability and shuns vices.  It is a distinction of character and behavior rather than of class, ethnicity, or any other consideration.  The statesman Edmund Burke said, “A king may make a nobleman but he cannot make a gentleman.”In fact it was a king, James 1^st, who is reputed to have said, ‘I can make a lord,’ he told his old nurse when she begged him to make her son a gentleman, ‘but only God Almighty can make a gentleman.’

A real gentleman is truly a noble man, a worthy man, a conscientious man, a man of integrity and honor who is generous and acts rightly from good principles.  He is honest, courageous, gracious, polite and considerate of others. 

In the literature of my Church some of the qualities of such a man, Moroni, were noted: Moroni was “…a man of perfect understanding; yea a man who did not delight in bloodshed; a man whose soul did joy in the liberty and freedom of his country; …a man whose heart did swell with thanksgiving to his God for the many privileges and blessing which He bestowed upon His people; a man who did labor exceedingly for the welfare and safety of his people; …who was firm in the faith of Christ; …who…taught never to give an offense; …to [do] good; to resist iniquity….

In my April 8, 2011 posting I lauded the views of the philosopher Confucius regarding the nature of a gentleman.  It is in these gentler, more refined, more considerate and thoughtful and polite qualities that he discusses that many of our young men, today, apparently get little training. 

 

A good place to start for any man, young or old would be to review and commit (or recommit) to the Scout Law of the Boy Scouts of America:  ‘A scout [gentleman] is trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous,  kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent.’

Who could argue with that?  Who couldn’t benefit himself or others by such conduct?