sions whither they cannot tell. Justice, and only justice, shall always be our motto. And yet it will be no cool process of mere science. The Nation has been deeply stirred, stirred by a solemn pas5 sion, stirred by the knowledge of wrong, of ideals lost, of government too often debauched and made an instrument of evil. The feelings with which we face this new age of right and opportunity sweep across our heartstrings like some air out of God's own presence, where 10 justice and mercy are reconciled and the judge and the brother are one. We know our task to be no mere task of politics but a task which shall search us through and through, whether we be able to understand our time and the need of our people, whether we be indeed their spokes15 men and interpreters, whether we have the pure heart to comprehend and the rectified will to choose our high course of action. ΙΟ This is not a day of triumph; it is a day of dedication.° Here muster, not the forces of the party, but the forces 20 of humanity. Men's hearts wait upon us; men's lives hang in the balance; we will do. Who shall live up to the great trust? Who dares fail to try? I summon all honest men, all patriotic, all forward-looking men, to my side. God helping me, I will not fail them. If they will but counsel and sustain me! 25 WOODROW WILSON 13. THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE DELIVERED IN FRONT OF INDEPENDENCE HALL, WE are assembled to celebrate the one hundred and thirtyeighth anniversary of the birth of the United States. I suppose that we can more vividly realize the circumstances of that birth standing on this historic spot than it would be possible to realize them anywhere else. The Declara- 5 tion of Independence was written in Philadelphia; it was adopted in this historic building by which we stand. I have just had the privilege of sitting in the chair of the great man who presided over the deliberations of those who gave the declaration to the world. My hand rests 10 at this moment upon the table upon which the declaration was signed. We can feel that we are almost in the visible and tangible presence of a great historic transaction. Have you ever read the Declaration of Independence° or attended with close comprehension to the real character 15 of it when you have heard it read? If you have, you will know that it is not a Fourth of July oration. The Declaration of Independence was a document preliminary to war. It was a vital piece of practical business, not a piece of rhetoric; and if you will pass beyond those preliminary 20 passages which we are accustomed to quote about the rights of men and read into the heart of the document ΙΟ you will see that it is very express and detailed, that it consists of a series of definite specifications concerning actual public business of the day. Not the business of our day, for the matter with which it deals is past, but 5 the business of that first revolution by which the Nation was set up, the business of 1776. Its general statements, its general declarations can not mean anything to us unless we append to it a similar specific body of particulars as to what we consider the essential business of our own day. Liberty does not consist, my fellow citizens, in mere general declarations of the rights of man. It consists in the translation of those declarations into definite action. Therefore, standing here where the declaration was adopted, reading its businesslike sentences, we ought to ask our15 selves what there is in it for us. There is nothing in it for us unless we can translate it into the terms of our own conditions and of our own lives. We must reduce it to what the lawyers call a bill of particulars. It contains a bill of particulars, but the bill of particulars of 1776. If we would 20 keep it alive, we must fill it with a bill of particulars of the year 1914. The task to which we have constantly to readdress ourselves is the task of proving that we are worthy of the men who drew this great declaration and know what they 25 would have done in our circumstances. Patriotism con sists in some very practical things practical in that they belong to the life of every day, that they wear no extraordinary distinction about them, that they are connected with commonplace duty. The way to be patriotic 30 in America is not only to love America but to love the duty that lies nearest to our hand and know that in performing it we are serving our country. There are some gentlemen in Washington, for example, at this very moment who are showing themselves very patriotic in a way which does not attract wide attention but seems to belong to mere everyday obligations. The Members of the House and Senate who stay in hot Washington to maintain a quorum 5 of the Houses and transact the all-important business of the Nation are doing an act of patriotism. I honor them for it, and I am glad to stay there and stick by them until the work is done. It is patriotic, also, to learn what the facts of our na- 10 tional life are and to face them with candor. I have heard a great many facts stated about the present business conditions of this country, for example a great many allegations of fact, at any rate, but the allegations do not tally with one another. And yet I know that truth always 15 matches with truth; and when I find some insisting that everything is going wrong and others insisting that everything is going right, and when I know from a wide observation of the general circumstances of the country taken as a whole that things are going extremely well, I wonder what 20 those who are crying out that things are wrong are trying to do. Are they trying to serve the country, or are they trying to serve something smaller than the country? Are they trying to put hope into the hearts of the men who work and toil every day, or are they trying to plant dis- 25 couragement and despair in those hearts? And why do they cry that everything is wrong and yet do nothing to set it right? If they love America and anything is wrong amongst us, it is their business to put their hand with ours to the task of setting it right. When the facts are known 30 and acknowledged, the duty of all patriotic men is to accept them in candor and to address themselves hopefully and confidently to the common counsel which is necessary to act upon them wisely and in universal concert. I have had some experiences in the last fourteen months which have not been entirely reassuring. It was univer5 sally admitted, for example, my fellow citizens, that the banking system of this country needed reorganization. We set the best minds that we could find to the task of discovering the best method of reorganization. But we met with hardly anything but criticism from the bankers 10 of the country; we met with hardly anything but resistance from the majority of those at least who spoke at all concerning the matter. And yet so soon as that act was passed there was a universal chorus of applause, and the very men who had opposed the measure joined in that 15 applause. If it was wrong the day before it was passed, why was it right the day after it was passed? Where had been the candor of criticism not only, but the concert of counsel which makes legislative action vigorous and safe and successful? 20 It is not patriotic to concert measures against one another; another. it is patriotic to concert measures for one In one sense the Declaration of Independence has lost its significance. It has lost its significance as a declara25 tion of national independence. Nobody outside of America believed when it was uttered that we could make good our independence; now nobody anywhere would dare to doubt that we are independent and can maintain our independence. As a declaration of independence, therefore, 30 it is a mere historic document. Our independence is a fact so stupendous that it can be measured only by the size and energy and variety and wealth and power of one |