The emotion of fear is what drives all animals away from life-threatening situations, and that is not the kind of fear I have in mind. Feelings, on the other hand, are more complicated and involve cognitive reactions that combine, or can be combined, with emotions, memories, experience, and intelligence. That is the kind of fear I have in mind—the feeling of fear that involves an intelligent, cognitive reaction. Fear that requires self-consciousness.

My horoscope for yesterday agrees: "Fear keeps you alert better than coffee can.  It also plays with your sense of time, helping you experience the power of nanoseconds.  Your performance will get a lift because you channel your fear well."

I don't disagree. I try to be self-conscious working through my fears with cognition.  But fear is a bad beginning.  Anything born mostly of fear is suspect. Combining the emotion of fear with conscious feeling of fear is insufficient, even dangerous.

Fear is a self-justifying feeling.  From the involuntary emotion of fear can too easily arise self-righteous volition.  Under attack nearly any response is right. And under fear's influence, a mere slight can seem a deadly spear.