DAN should have quit while he was ahead.

“We’ve shared a lot in the 24 years we’ve been meeting here each evening and, before I say goodnight this night, I need to say thank you,” Dan Rather said last night as he launched into a farewell speech at the conclusion of his last broadcast as anchor of “The CBS Evening News.”

“Thank you,” he continued, “to the thousands of wonderful professionals at CBS News, past and present, with whom it has been my honor to work over these years.”

So far, so good.

“And a deeply felt thanks to all of you who have let us into your homes night after night. It has been a privilege and one never taken lightly.”

Well done, Dan. Great speech. See you around.

What? There’s more?

Of course there’s more! This was Dan Rather – anchor, reporter, orator – and he was saying good-bye after 24 years as the face of CBS News.

“Not long after I first came to the anchor chair, I briefly signed off using the word ‘courage,’ ” Dan then said, launching into “Farewell Speech, Part II,” and sounding a bit like Ted Baxter when Ted would start going off on one of his speeches about his early career.

“I want to return to it now in a different way,” Dan said.

Then he wished “courage” on “a nation still nursing a broken heart” from 9/11; on military servicepeople overseas; on tsunami victims, and then all victims of natural disasters everywhere; on “the oppressed” and the poor and the sick.

“To my fellow journalists in places where reporting the truth means risking all, and to each of you, courage. For ‘The CBS Evening News,’ Dan Rather reporting. Good night.”

Well, at least Dan didn’t disappoint. This speech was vintage Rather, a man who stubbornly marches to the beat of his own drum, even to the point of invoking a word – “courage” – for which he was derided back when he first introduced it 20-some years ago.

To his credit, Dan shed no tears in delivering his farewell. And until the final segment, when he bestowed his blessing of “courage” upon the world, he played it straight, delivering the day’s news as he always had.

When the broadcast ended, the words on screen said, “Managing editor, Dan Rather.”

And as the end-credits rolled, he could be seen enveloped by his co-workers, who crowded the West 57th Street studio and gave their chief an affectionate standing ovation.