D 



From "Lest We Forget" 



The fact that the address bearing the above-mentioned 

 title marked a turning point in my Hfe seems to justify 

 me in making here a somewhat extended quotation 

 from it: 



It is too late for us now to ask how we got into the war. 

 Was it inevitable? Was it wise? Was it righteous? We need 

 not ask those questions, because the answers will not help us. 

 We may have our doubts as to one or all of these, but all doubts 

 we must keep to ourselves. We are in the midst of battle, and 

 must fight to the end. The "rough riders" are in the saddle. 

 . . . The crisis comes when the war is over. What then? Our 

 question is not what we shall do with Cuba, Porto Rico, and 

 the Philippines. It is what these prizes will do to us. Can 

 we let go of them in honor or in safety? If not, what if we hold 

 them? What will be the reflex effect of great victories, sud- 

 denly realized strength, the patronizing applause, the ill- 

 concealed envy of great nations, the conquest of strange terri- 

 tories, the raising of our flag beyond the seas? All this is new 

 to us. It is un-American; it is contrary to our traditions; 

 it is delicious; it is intoxicating. 



For this is the fact before us. We have come to our man- 

 hood among the nations of the earth. What shall we do about 

 it? The war once finished, shall we go back to our farms and 

 factories, to our squabbles over tariff's and coinage, our petty 

 trading in peanuts and post oflRces? Or shall our country turn 

 away from these things and stand forth once for all a great 

 naval power, our vessels in every sea, our influence felt over 

 all the earth? Shall we be the plain United States again, or 

 shall we be another England, fearless even of our own great 

 mother, second to her only in age and prestige? . . . 



The war has stirred the fires of patriotism, we say. Cer- 

 tainly, but they were already there, else they could not be 



C 695 1 



