We are provincials no longer. The tragic events of the 30 months of vital turmoil through which we have just passed have made us citizens of the world. There can be no turning back.
No man ever saw the people of whom he forms a part. No man ever saw a government. I live in the midst of the Government of the United States, but I never saw the Government of the United States. Its personnel extends through all the nations, and across the seas, and into every corner of the world in the persons of the representatives of the United States in foreign
capitals and in foreign centres of commerce.
May it not suffice for me to say ... that of course like every other man of intelligence and education I do believe in organic evolution. It surprises me that at this late date such questions should be raised.
Surely a man has come to himself only when he has found the best that is in him, and has satisfied his heart with the highest achievement he is fit for.
Neutrality is a negative word. It is a word that does not express what America ought to feel. America has a heart, and that heart throbs with all sorts of intense sympathies... We are not trying to keep out of trouble; we are trying to preserve the foundations upon which peace can be rebuilt.
Scholarship cannot do without literature.... It needs literature to float it, to set it current, to authenticate it to all the race, to get it out of closets and into the brains of men who stir abroad.
The soul of me is very selfish. I have gone my way after a fashion that made me the center of the plan. And you who are so individual, who are so independent a spirit, whose soul is also a kingdom, have been so loyal, so forgiving, so self-sacrificing in your willingness to live my life. Nothing but love cold have accomplished so wonderful a thing.
Justice has nothing to do with expediency. Justice has nothing to do with any temporary standard whatever. It is rooted and grounded in the fundamental instincts of humanity.
There is such a thing as man being too proud to fight. There is such a thing as a nation being so right that it does not need to convince others by force that it is right.