Have you no pride?

[Lhunardawen]

All things in excess are bad. Too much pride is the root of all evil. It was excessive pride that caused Lucifer's downfall-- he took too much pride in his beauty and power, being one of the, if not the sole, highest angels. He thought he could overthrow God and rule all creation in His stead, so he took one-third of the angels and led a rebellion against God. But of course, no one could defeat the Creator of all things, so Lucifer and his angels were thrown from heaven and are now trying to seduce people to evil.

Sounds familiar? How about Morgoth? He was also chosen by Eru to be the most powerful of the Ainur, and then what? He tried to form his own chorale to rival that of Eru, but Eru's voice was more beautiful and dreadful and powerful, so Morgoth lost the Ainulindale Singing Competition (very loose translation...very loose).

See the pattern? All of the Middle-Earth characters you have previously mentioned have been bestowed with talents and strengths to die for; it is then up to them to use these gifts as they will. Will they rely solely on themselves and refuse others' aid? Will they try to grasp more than what they know is good for them? Will they seek dominion over those they deem weaker, though they know they should not? All these and more are manifestations of too much pride over what people are gifted with...which in the end will be harmful to their very selves.

[Keeper of Dol Guldur]

This is simple enough;

Confidence is in the middle of a teeter-totter, pride is on one end, and modesty / humbleness is on the other.

Balancing it in the middle is tricky - it swings one way or another a lot, but as long as neither end hits the ground, things should be okay.

You'll have to forgive my elementary school playground description for it, but it was the simplest thing I could think of off the top of my head. Possibly over-simple. But, it works.

[Eomer of the Rohirrim]

Keeper, are you saying that pride and modesty are bad things in themselves?

[Boromir88]

I was going to start a thread on this topic, but I think it fits well under pride, so I'll just talk about it here. Patriotism- pride for one's country. Patriotism is on many levels, the same way pride is, there's a good side to pride, and a bad side. I think it's good to be proud of one's country, that can definately be a good thing, but many country's (especially WW1 and WW2) have gone to war because of patriotism. Thinking their country was the mightier then everyone else, leading to the arm's race, and mass build up of guns, weapons...etc. Patriotism is another trait the Boromir seems to represent, as he's always talking about the "Men of Minas Tirith," and the "Men from my country."

[Fingolfin II]

Boro said:

Patriotism is another trait the Boromir seems to represent, as he's always talking about the "Men of Minas Tirith," and the "Men from my country."

True, but Aragorn also bandied his patriotism around a lot- the Dunedain, his heritage, Rangers of the North etc. Don't forget the incident with Hama at the doors of Meduseld- 'Death shall come to any man who draws Elendil's sword, save Elendil's heir'. So, as you said, patriotism is another type of pride.

This leads me to ask another question; how much pride is too much? As already illustrated in this thread, you need a certain amount of pride to have confidence in yourself and to accomplish things (e.g. Aragorn), yet too much pride and overconfidence in one's abilites can corrupt and bias decisions negatively (e.g. Denethor).

Humility is an important attribute in LotR. Aragorn possessed it and therefore his pride was counterbalanced, as Lhunardarwen said. Denethor on the other hand may have started off humble, yet he became more proud and this ultimately lead him to disaster. His pride led him to enforce his will on others, such as his Council and Faramir, and therefore, I believe that too much pride is bad (duh) and Tolkien used it as an example of one of the 7 Deadly Sins in LotR as a measure against humility.

[Lhunardawen]

Originally Posted by Fingolfin II

This leads me to ask another question; how much pride is too much?

I've been thinking...and I realized all pride is bad. The problem lies in the terminologies. There's pride in yourself, we call that self-confidence (and the feeling of achievement). There's pride in your country, that's patriotism. But both of this is "pride" in substantial amounts. I think pride is too much self-confidence, too much patriotism. Pride is the excess of these supposedly positive attitudes. That makes it bad in itself. And arrogance is a manifestation of pride, among others.

But English really is a confusing language...

[SamwiseGamgee]

Lhunardawen, I agree with you. Pride is an excess.

pride n. too high an opinion of oneself; inordinate self-esteem

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