The Caldwell tribune. [volume] (Caldwell, Idaho Territory [Idaho]) 1883-1928, 1903-01-24

and make that human nature better.
I have been acquainted especially
with these types of your work, the
work in the army and navy, among
railroad men and among college
students. Now these three classes
are not going to be effectively
reached as classes by any effort
which fails to take account of the
fact that they demand manliness as
well as virtue. and you can make
them straight on condition that you
keep in mind that it is necessary
for them to be strong.
In the long run the man who is
decent is apt to be the man who is
the best soldier. The work among
the railroad men always particularly
appealed to me because of the will
ingness Of those men to take risks,
to accept responsibilities. Those
who follow that pursuit have both
the power to obey and the power to
act on individual initiative, the
power to take responsibility. You
get among body of men like that
and you can make them accept NOR
ality if you make them understand
that it is not only compatible with
but is demanded by essential man
illness.
The work of the Y. NJ. G. A. has
grown so among the college students
because it has tried not to dwarf
any of the impulses of the young,
vigorous man, but to guide him
Alright. 1t has sought. not to make
his development one-sided, not to
prevent his being man, but to see
that he is in the fullest sense a man
and a good man. Among all these
that are here tonight, I know that
the rest among you will join with
me in saying that we greet with
particular pleasure the men who
served in the great war. Those
men won the day of trial because
they and their fellows had it in
them in the first place, the power of
devotion to an ideal, and in the
next place, the strength to realize
that power in effective fashion. I
do not care how good soldiers Or
sailors they had been if their ambi-
tions had been personal. If Grant
and Sherman and Thomas and Far
ragut had not all felt that they were
fighting for one end, that they were
holding up the arms of mighty
Lincoln as he toiled and wrought
and suffered for the people, then no
prowess would have prevailed.
This nation would have gone down
into bloody anarchy, would have
crumbled into dust as so many re-
publlcs have crumbled before. But
they had to have more than that;
they had to have fervent devotion
to country, to the right, and power
to fight. I do not care how patri-
otic the man was, if he could neith-
er march nor shoot, he was not any
good.
In addition to the lofty ideal, to
the Lower Of devotion, the man had
to have the fibre of heart, the fibre
Of body to make his devotion take
effective share for the nations wei
fare. And so it is now in civil life.
We will make this twentieth CEN
tury better and not worse than any
century has gone before it, because
we will, like this society, approach
the problems that face us with a
firm resolution that we will strike
to make the young men decent,
God-iearing, law-abiding, honor
loving, justice-doing, and will also
make them fearless and strong, able
to hold their own in the hurIy-bu11y
of the worlds work; able to strike
nightly that the forces of right
may be in the end triumphant.
Admiral Dewey, Secretary Root,
Col. J. J. MeCook of New York,
John R. Moot of New York, and
others, also spoke.