126 Presidential Addresses 



century, certainly a greater engineering feat than 

 has ever yet been successfully attempted among the 

 nations of mankind; and as it is the biggest thing of 

 its kind to be done I am glad it is the United States 

 that is to do it. Whenever a nation undertakes to 

 carry out a great destiny it must make up its mind 

 that there will be work and worry, labor and risk, 

 in doing the work. It is with a nation as it is with 

 an individual ; if you are content to attempt but little 

 in private life you may be able to escape a good deal 

 of worry, but you won't achieve very much. The 

 man who attempts much must make up his mind that 

 there will now and then come days and nights of 

 worry; there will come even moments of seeming 

 defeat. But out of the difficulties we wrest success. 

 So it is with the nation. It is not the easy task that 

 is necessarily the best. 



AT BANGOR, MAINE, AUGUST 27, 1902 



My Fellow-Citizens: 



I am glad to greet the farmers of Maine. Dur 

 ing the century that has closed, the growth of in 

 dustrialism has necessarily meant that cities and 

 towns have increased in population more rapidly 

 than the country districts. And yet, it remains true 

 now as it always has been, that in the last resort 

 the country districts are those in which we are surest 

 to find the old American spirit, the old American 

 habits of thought and ways of living. Conditions 

 have changed in the country far less than they have 



