Lower coast gazette., 1910-04-30

Sorbonne this afternoon to hear Col.
Theodore Roosevelt lecture on "Citi-
zenship in a Republic" 1t was an APP
preciative audience and the lecturer
was frequently a%pplauded. MIR.
Roosevelt said:
Foundations Of Our Republic.
This was the most famous unive~'
city of medieval Europe at a time
when no one dreamed that there was
a new world to discover. Its services
to the cause of human knowledge al
ready stretched far back into the
remote past at the time when my fore
fathers, three centuries ago, when
among the sparse bands of traders,
plowmen, wood choppers and fisher
folk, who, in a hard struggle with the
iron ~unfriendliness of the Indian
haunted land, were laying the founda-
tons Of what has now become the
giant republic of the west. TO con-
Quer a continent. to tame the shaggy
rOughness of wild nature means grim
warfare; and the generations engaged
in 1t cannot keep, still less add to,
the stores of garnered wisdom which
were therein, and which are still in
the hands of their brethren who dwell
in the old land. To conquer the
wilderness means to Wrest victory
from the same hostile forces with
which mankind struggled in the inn.
memorial infancy of our race. The
primeval conditions must be met by
primeval qualities which are incom.
patible with the retention of much
that has been painfully acquired by
humanity as through the ages it has
striven upward toward civilization.
In conditions so primitive there can
be but a primitive culture.
Building the Higher Life.
AS the country grows, its people, who
have won success in so many lines,
turn back to try to recover the pos.
sessions Of the mind and the spirit,
which perforce their fathers threw
aside in order better to wager the first
rough battles for the continent their
children inherit. The leaders of
thought and of action grope their way |
forward to a new life, realizing, some.
times dimly, sometimes clear-sighted.
ly, that the life of material gain,
whether for a nation or an individual,
Is of value only as a foundation, only
as there is added to it the uplift that
comes from devotion to loftier ideals.
The new life thus sought can in part
be developed afresh from what Is |
round about in the new world; but
1t can be developed in full only by
freely drawing upon the treasure ,
houses of the old world, upon the
treasures stored in the ancient abodes
of wisdom and learning, such as this
where | speak today.
1t is a mistake for any nation merely
to copy another; but 1t is an even
greater mistake, it is a proof of weak
ness in any nation, not to be anxious
learn from another, and willing and
able to adapt that learning to the new
national conditions and make It fruit.
full and productive therein. 1t is for
us of the new world to sit at the feet
OF the Gamaliel of the old; then if we
have the right stuff in us, we can show
that Paul, in his turn, can become a
teacher as well as a scholar.
Today, | shall speak to you on the
Of individual citizenship, the
one subject of vital Importance to you,
my hearers, and to mt and my coun.
because you and we are citi.
of great democratic republics. A
republic such as each of |
effort to realize in it's full
sense government by, of, and for the
)eople-represents the most gigantic
all possible social experiments, the
,ne fraught with greatest possibilities
alike for good and for evil.
Great Lesson of France.
france mas taught many lessons to
,ther nations; surely one of the most
important is the lesson her whole his
DRY teaches, that a high artistic and
development is compatible
With notable leadership in arms and
tatescraft. The brilliant gallantry of
he French soldier has for many cen.
been proverbial, and during
hese same centuries at every court in
the free masons of fashion"
ave treated the French tongue as
heir common speech; while every art I
st and man of letters, and every man
T science able to appreciate that mar.
elous instrument of precision, French !
rose, has turned towards France for I
i'd and inspiration. How long the lead
rship in arms and letters has lasted {
curiously illustrated by the fact that
ne earliest masterpiece in modern I
,ngue IS the splendid French epic I
hitch tells Of Roland's doom and the