RBPORT OF THE SECRETARY GENERAL. 59 



The path of opportunity Ues plain before us Americans. The Gov- 

 ernment and people of every Republic should strive to inspire in others 

 confidence and cooperation by exhibiting integrity of purpose and equity 

 in action. Let us as members of this congress, therefore, meet together 

 on the plane of common interests and together seek the common good. 

 Whatever is of common interest, whatever makes for the common good, 

 whatever demands united effort is a fit subject for applied Pan Ameri- 

 canism. Fraternal helpfulness is the keystone to the arch. Its pillars 

 are faith and justice. 



In this great movement this congress will, I believe, play an exalted 

 part. You, gentlemen, represent powerful intellectual forces in your 

 respective countries. Together you represent the enlightened thought 

 of the continent. The policy of Pan Americanism is practical. The 

 Pan American spirit is ideal. It finds its source and being in the minds 

 of thinking men. It is the offspring of the best, the noblest conception 

 of international obUgation. 



With all earnestness, therefore, I commend to you, gentlemen, the 

 thought of the American Republics, twenty-one sovereign and independent 

 nations, bound together by faith and justice, and firmly cemented by a 

 sympathy which knows no superior and no inferior, but which recognizes 

 only equality and fraternity. 



The following is the address of the president of the congress, the ambas- 

 sador of Chile, Senor Don Eduardo Sudrez Mujica, in response to the 

 address of welcome by the Secretary of State : 



ADDRESS OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE CONGRESS, 

 THE AMBASSADOR OF CHILE. 



Excellencies, Messrs. Delegates, Ladies and Gentlemen: 



It now behooves me to say a few words on this memorable occasion. 

 So well known are they that I do not have to dwell upon the charac- 

 teristics forming the essence of this great assembly and which are not 

 ordinarily to be found in international gatherings of a wider scope. Its 

 purpose, of a purely intellectual order, free from any interests outside of 

 those of scientific research, displays that mark of nobleness and dignity 

 peculiar to mental efforts when the mind strives for a greater amount of 

 light — a white, intensive, and pure light — to enlighten the path of human 

 progress. Man, creation's superior being, owes to himself and to the 

 infinite diversifications of matter coming under his control the duty of 

 continually developing himself, so that he may be worthy of his semi- 

 divine r61e and in order to increase, also unceasingly, the welfare and 



