Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1910-06-08
THEODORE ROOSEVELT GUEST
OF HONOR AT OLD OXFORD.
Delivers Romanes Lecture on Biological
Analogies and Receives Honorary Degree
OF Doctor OF Civil Law==-Day Proves
Strenuous for the Ex=President.


lions that have expanded and that
have played mighty part in the
| world, have in the end grown old and
| weakened and vanished; but so have
the nations whose only thought was
to avoid all danger, ali effort, who
would risk nothing, and who there
fore gained nothing. In the end the
same fate may overwhelm all alike;
but the memory OF the one type per-
ishes with it, while the other leaves
its mark deep on the history of all
the future of mankind.
"A nation that seemingly dies may
xDe born again; and even though in
the physical sense it die utterly, it
may yet hand down a history of heroic
achievement and for all time to some
may profoundly influence the nations
that arise i'm it's place by the impress
| of what it has done. Best of all is it
TO do our part well, and at the same
time to see cur blood live young and
vital in men and women fit to take up
the task as we lay it down: for so
shall our seed inherit the earth. But
ii this. which is best, is denied us,
then at least it is ours to remember
that if we choose we can be torch
bearers, as our fathers were before
US. The torch has been handed on
from nation to nation, from civiliZa-
ton to civilization, throughout all re-
corded time. from the dim years be-
fore history dawned. down to the
blazing splendor of this teeming CEN
fury of ours. 1t dropped from the
hand of the coward and the sluggard.
Of I'm, Inv
of ease. the man whose soul was eaten
away by self Indulgence: it has been
kept alight only by those who were
mighty of heart and cunning of hand.
What they worked at, providing it
was worth doing at all, was of less
matter than how they worked, whether
in the realm of the mind or the realm
of the body. If their work was good,
ii what they achieved was of sub
stance then high success was really
theirs.
while freely admitting all of our
follieS ana weaknesses of today il is
yet mere perversity to refuse TO real
i've the incredible advance that has
been made in ethical standards. | do
not believe that there is the slightest
necessary connection between any
Weakening of virla force and this ad-
vance in the moral standard, this
growth of the sense OF obligation to
ores neighbOr and of reluctance to
do that neighbOr wrong. We need
have scant patience with that silly
synicism which insists that kindness
OF character only accompanies weak
. ness of character. On the contrary.
Just as in private life many of the
men of strongest character are the
very men of lOftieSt and most exalted
morality, so believe that in nation
al life as the ages go by we shall find
that the permanent national types will
more and more tend towards those in
which, while the intellect stands high.
character stands higher: in which
rugged strength and courage. rugged
capacity to resist wrongful aggression
by others. will go hand in hand with
a lofty scorn OF doing wrong to
others. This is the type of Timoleon,
of Hampden, of Washington and Lin
COIN These We're as good men. and
disnterested and unselfish men, as
ever served a State; and they We're al
so as strong men as ever founded or
saved state. Surely such examples
prove that there is nothing Utopian in
our effort to combine justice and
strength in the same nation. The
really high civilizations must them
selves supply the antidote to the self
indulgence anG love of ease which they
tend to produce.
Every modern civilized nation has
| many and terrible problems tC solve
| within it's own borders. problems that
| arise not merely from juXtaposition OF
| poverty and riches, but especially from
| the self consciousness of both poverty
| and riches. Each nation must deal
| with these matters in it's own faShiOn,
| and yet the spirit in which the prob
| lem is approached must ever be fund
amentally the same. 1t must be
spirit of broad humanity: of brother
| " kindness; of acceptance of respon-
| sibility. one for each and each for all,
| and at the same time a spirit as re-
| mote as the poles from every form OF
| weakness and seEtlmentality. AS in
| war to pardon the coward is to do
| cruel wrong to the brave man whose
life his cowardice ieopardizes, 50 in
civil affairs it is revolving to every
principle of justice to give to the lazy.
| the vicious or even the feeble and
dull witted a reward which is really
the robbery of what drawer, wiser.
ADLER men have earned. The only eff
fective way to help any man is to help
him to help himself, and the worst
lesson to teach him is that he can
be permanently helped at the expense
of some one else. True liberty shows
itself to best advantage in protecting
the rights of others. and especially OF
minorties Privilege should not be
tolerated because it is to the advan-
taee of a minority, nor yet because 1t
Is to the advantage of a majority
No doctrinaire theories Of vested
rights or freedom of contract can
stand i'm the way of our cutting out
! abuses from the body politlc. .lnS'
as little can we afford to follow the
doctrinaires If an impossible-ahd m
cidentaliy of highly nnheSlrahi'
social revolution which. III destroy ms
individual rights Gnclndine lr"h"r''
rights and the family, would deS'r'''
the two chief agents in the advance @
mankind. AMI the two ehie' reasons
| why either the advance or IN" nreser'