56 Presidential Addresses 



themselves to act in the ordinary affairs of the na 

 tional life. You can not expect that much will be 

 done in the supreme hour of peril by soldiers who 

 have not fitted themselves to meet the need when 

 the need comes, and you can not expect the highest 

 type of citizenship in the periods when it is needed 

 if that citizenship has not been trained by the faith 

 ful performance of ordinary duty. What we need 

 most in this Republic is not special genius, not un 

 usual brilliancy, but the honest and upright ad 

 herence on the part of the mass of the citizens and 

 of their representatives to the fundamental laws of 

 private and public morality which are now what 

 they have been during recorded history. We shall 

 succeed or fail in making this Republic what it 

 should be made I will go a little further than that 

 what it shall and must be made, accordingly as we 

 do or do not seriously and resolutely set ourselves 

 to do the tasks of citizenship and good citizenship 

 consists in doing the many small duties, private and 

 public, which in the aggregate make it up. 



AT ARLINGTON, MEMORIAL DAY, MAY 30, 1902 



Mr. Commander; Comrades; and you, the men and 

 women of the United States ivho owe your being 

 here to what was done by the men of the great 

 Civil War: 



I greet you, and thank you for the honor done 

 me in asking me to be present this day. It is a 

 good custom for our country to have certain 



