In a letter to his son, Robert E Lee urged the young man to cultivate the virtue of frankness: “You must study to be frank with the world: frankness is the child of honest courage. Say what you mean to do on every occasion, and take it for granted you mean to do right. If a friend should ask a favor, you should grant it, if it is possible and reasonable; if not, tell him plainly why you cannot. You will wrong him and yourself by equivocation of any kind. Never do a wrong thing to make a friend or keep one. The man who requires you to do so is dearly purchased at a sacrifice. Deal kindly but firmly with all your classmates. You will find it the policy which wears best. Above all do not appear to others what you are not. If you have any fault to find with anyone, tell him, not others, of what you complain. There is no more dangerous experiment than that of undertaking to be one thing before a man's face and another behind his back.”