Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1915-11-05
Continued from Page one)

who know how to use it. 1 have no
doubt that to- great many of you
has come genuine stimulation in the
associations of this place and that as
the years have multiplied you have
seen more and more the useful ends
which may be served by organizations
of this sort.
Common Interest
But have not come to speak wholly
Of that, for there are others OF your
own members who can speak of the
club with a knowledge and an intelli-
sence which no one can have who has
not been, intimately associated with It,
Men band themselves together for the
sake Of the association no doubt, but
also for something greater and deeper
than that,-because they are conscious
of common interests lying outside their
business occupations. because they are
members of the same community and
in frequent intercourse find mutual
stimulation and a real maximum of vi
tality and power I shall assume that
here around the dinner table on this
memorial occasion our talk should
properly turn to the wide and common
thoughts, whether they be the interests
of the community or Of the nation.
A year and half ago our thought
would have been almost altogether of
great domestic questions. They are
many and of vital consequence. We
must and shall address ourselves to
their solution with diligence. firmness,
and self possession. Notwithstanding
And n
world disturbed by great disaster and
ablaze with terrible war: but our
thought is now inevitably of new
things about which formerly we gave
ourselves little concern. We are think
ing now chiefly of our relations with
the rest of the world,--not our COM
mercial relations.-about those we
have thought and planned always
but about our political relations. our
duties as an individual and indepen-
dent force in the world to ourselves,
our neighbors, and the world Itself.
FRIEND Of the Free
Our principles are Well known. 1t
is not necessary to avow them again.
We believe in political liberty and
founded our great government to OBJ
tain it. the liberty of men and of peo-
plas.-of men to choose their own lives
and of peoples to choose their own al
legiance. Our ambition; also, all the
world has knowledge of. 1t is not only
TO he free and prosperous ourselves,
Iut also to be the friend and thought
full partisan of those who are free or
who desire freedom the world over. If
we have had aggressive purposes and
covetous ambitions they were the fruit
of our thoughtless youth as a nation
and we have put them aside. We shall,
/ confidently believe, never again take
another foot of territory by conquest.
We shall never in any circumstances
seek to make an Independent people
subject to our dominion; because we
believe. we passionately believe. in the
right of every people to choose their
own allegiance and be free of masters
altogether. For ourselves we wish
nothing but the full liberty of self
development: and with ourselves in
this great matter we associate all the
peoples of our own hemisphere. We
wish not only for the United States
T. 'bur sfor. them the fullest freedom OF
independent growth and of action. for
we know that throughout this hemis-
phere the same aspirations are every
where being worked out, under diverse
conditions but with the same impulse
and ultimate object.
Need Of Armament
All this is very clear to us and will.
confidently predict, become more and
more clear to the whole world as the
great processes of the future unfold
themselves. 1t is with full conscious
ness of such principles and such am
billions that we are asking ourselves
at the present time what our duty is
with regard to the armed force of the
Nation. Within year We have wit
messed what We did not believe pos
sible. great European conflict involv-
ing many of the greatest nations of the
world. The influences of great war