The Roswell daily record. [volume] (Roswell, N.M.) 1903-current, 1910-06-08
ROOSEVELT
OPTIMISTIC

London. June 7.-Colonel Theodore
Roosevelt spoke at the oxford Uni
versity today and took as the subject
of his lecture biological Analogies
il History" Col. Roosevelt said
Rome fell by attack from without
only because the ills within her own
borders had grown ncurable. What
is true of your country, any hearers.
is true of my own; while we should
lie vigilant against foes from without
Yet we need never really fear them
SO long as we safeguard ourselves
against the enemies within our own
households; and these enemies are
Our own passions and follies. Free
Tseoples can escape being mastered
by Others only by being able to mas
ter themselves. We Americans. and
yor people of the British Isles alike,
heed ever to keep in mind that. a
-nong the many Qualities indispen-
sable To the success of a great de-
.nOcracy. and second only to a nign
and stern sense of duty, of moral OBJ
legation are selfknowledge and self
mastery. You, my hosts, and | may
not agree in all our views, some of
yGi would think me a very radical
de-nocrat-as. for the matter of that,
l am: and my theory of Imperialism
would probably suit the anti-imperal-
lists as little as it would suit a certain
type of forcible-feeble imperialist.
But there are some points on which
We must all agree if We think sound
ly. The precise form of government.
conocratic or otherwise. is the in
st-'meLt. the tool, with which we
work. IL is important to have a good
tool. But even If it is the best possi-
hle. il il only a tool. No Implement
can ever take the place of the guild
ing intelligence that wields il. A ve-
ry bad tool will ruin the work of the
best craftsman: but a good tool in
bad hands is no better. In the last
analysis the all-important factor in
national greatness is national char
acter.
There are questions that we of
the great civilized nations are ever
tempted to ask of the future. Is our
time of growth drawing to an end
Are we as nations soon to come un-
der the rule of that great law OF
death which is itself but part of the
great law of life? None can tell.
Forces that We can see and other
forces that are hidden or that can
but dimly be apprelended are at work
all around us. both for good and for
evil. The growth in luxury. in love
OF ease, in taste for vapid and friv
olous excitement. is both evident ard
unhealthy. The most ominous sign IL
the diminution in the birth-rate, and
the rate of natural increase, now to
a larger or lesser degree shared by
mos. of the civilized nations of CEN
trail ard western Europe Of Aneri
Ca and Australia; a dinirution so
great tlat IL it obtains for the next
century at the rate which has OBJ
tanned for the last twenty-five years.
all the more highly civilized peoples
win be stationary or else have begun
TO go backward in population, while
many of them will have already gone
very far backward.
There is much that should give
MS concern for the future. But there
is much also which should give us
hope. No man is more .apt TO be
mistaken than the prophet of evil.
After the French Revolution in 1880.
Niebuhr hazarded the guess that all
civilization was about to go down
with a crash. that we were all about
TO share the fail Of third and fourth
century Rome-a respectable but
painfully overworked comparison The
fears once expressed. by the follow
ers of Mahhus as to the future of
tine world nave proved groundless as
regards the civilized portion of the
world: IL In strange indeed to look
back at Carlyle's prophecies of some
seventy years ago. and then think OF
the teesning life OF achievement tae
life of conquest of ieyery kind. and