Virtues

The qualities of character a life is actually built out of — what Values look like once they have been practised long enough to become who someone is.

A value is something a person holds. A virtue is something a person has become. The distance between the two is practice, and it is the whole subject: nobody argues themselves into courage, and nobody acquires patience by agreeing with it. Virtues are trained the way a craft is trained — badly at first, in company, with someone watching who has gone further (Apprenticeship · Mastery · Learning By Doing · Shu-ha-ri).

The canon keeps an open roll rather than a closed code, and the roll is long: Courage · Perseverance · responsibility · self-discipline · self-governance · compassion · Faith and faithfulness · kindness · honesty and truthful speech · loyalty · friendship · empathy · Respect · fairness · Self Control · generosity · Gratitude · Forgiveness · Wisdom · knowledge · open-mindedness · patience · diligence · Creativity · co-operation · tolerance · humour · self-confidence · flexibility and adaptability · forbearance · prudence · moderation · graciousness · selflessness · trustworthiness · self-reflection · Citizenship · strength. The list is not a syllabus and it is not ranked. It is closer to a field guide: a vocabulary precise enough that a person can name what they are short of.

Two things keep it from becoming moralism. First, the virtues are not separable — courage without wisdom is recklessness, kindness without honesty is flattery, discipline without love is cruelty; each is held in tune by the others, which is why no single one can be maximised (Wisdom · Proportionality). Second, they are not a test a person passes but a direction a person walks, and the honest measure is a little better than last season (Continuous Improvement · Becoming).

A body needs them for a structural reason, not only a moral one. Every arrangement in the Game — a word kept, a role handed on, an objection heard, a membrane guarded — depends on people who can do the hard thing when nobody would know. Structure buys time for character; it does not substitute for it (Integrity · A word given is a word kept).

Also called: the virtues · qualities of character Stands on: Values · Principles · Ethics · Discipline Opens onto: Courage · Perseverance · Self Control · Respect · Honor · Integrity · Righteousness · Wisdom · Forgiveness · Gratitude · Embodiment · Pillar X — Sacred Guardianship and Order In play: the daily practice, and the look-back — a Player names the one virtue this season asked for and did not get Sources: Virtues (root page, stub — an index of forty-odd linked names and no claim of its own) · the individual value pages beneath it (root, stubs) · Principles (root page, draft) · lionsberg.wiki: Virtues Open: The root page is a list of links and most of the names beneath it carry a single boilerplate sentence; there is no canon page saying how a virtue is formed, only which ones are named. · The roll overlaps the Values list heavily and nothing distinguishes the two vocabularies.