He saw facts, knew them, mastered and used them, and never gave much play to fancy; but as his business in life was with men and facts, this deficiency, if it was one, was of little moment.
Lodge praises Washington's ability to focus on facts and mastery of reality over fanciful thinking.
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But they were dangerous then, and Washington, with his honest hatred of all that seemed to him to partake of meanness or treason, proposed to put them down and render them harmless, being well convinced, after his clear-sighted fashion…
He fought to free the colonies from England, and make them independent, not to play the part of a Cæsar or a Cromwell in the wreck and confusion of civil war.
It is a hard thing to beat an opposing army, but it is equally hard to bring human jealousies and ambitions into the narrow path of self-sacrifice and subordination.
Washington was wholly free from the vulgar ambition of the usurper, and the desire of mere personal aggrandizement found no place in his nature.