by Andrew J. Zintl

Created on: September 04, 2008

Integrity is really a combination of virtues working simultaneously. At the absolute minimum, to accurately claim to have integrity, one must have the virtues of honesty, sincerity, and courage. Alone, each of these is a positive trait, which may falter in a person if the others are lacking. In this sense, integrity is like a three-legged stool. If any of the three legs is missing, the stool will not function properly. Honesty, sincerity, and courage must be in balance as integrity's three legs or the whole thing will fall to the ground.

First, honesty is necessary. The quality of a person whose word can always be trusted must first be developed if one desires to be known for having integrity. When people know that they can trust your opinion and your promises, they will come to you more often for advice or assistance because of your reputation as an honest person. Making only those promises that you know you can keep will result in a solid leg for integrity, made out of the soundest oak.

Sincerity is the next indispensable component of integrity. People despise hypocrisy wherever it is found. Hypocrisy is also one of the most easily recognizable vices and can only be combated by sincerity, its polar opposite among the virtues. A sincere person will live out any advice that they give to another person. The necessity of asking a sincere person for advice will soon disappear if one watches such a person long enough because their advice will be evident by their actions. Sincerity, as a gentler virtue, will soften the harsh aspects of honesty in a person who possesses both virtues. It will be as a leg crafted from the sweet heart of the maple tree in the stool of integrity.

Finally, courage must be cultivated as the third and last component of integrity. It takes courage to continue to practice any of the other virtues when it would be much easier to get ahead in the world by being deceitful and stabbing other people in the back. Courage is required to continue living a moral life when everyone around you mocks you for it. Courage is the unbending virtue, the one that never falters even in the toughest circumstances. In the stool of integrity, it is like a leg forged from the purest steel.

The measure of integrity is simply how often a person exhibits these virtues. A person who constantly displays each of these virtues has a much higher level of integrity than the person who only practices them when it is convenient or easy to do so. As stools vary in height according to the length of their legs, so does the height of integrity in a man or woman by the depth of their virtues.

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