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Rh this rich inheritance is ours to begin with. Therefore we have the means to seize a new opportunity in the world's history.

Our unique historical and social setting is inspiring. If not "the noblest offspring of time," this Western civilization is surely a choice product of time. Those who laid its foundations were a peculiar type, pioneers of the pioneers, men and women of heroic mould.

The framework they erected was in accord with the might and majesty of nature around them and the puissant ambitions within them. Their purpose was writ large; they planted universities in log houses in the wilderness and established a Christian civilization. Shut in by ocean and mountain-barrier, this vast region slowly became the home of a group of states. No problem of alien blood is here; no problem of crowded poverty is here; no menace from anarchy; no blight of atheism. A home sweet with the odors of forest trees, fragrant with the breath of wild flowers, purified by cleansing torrents, cooled by snow-capped mountains piercing skies whose blue would have entranced Ruskin and the painters who first saw nature; a home of virgin fields and virgin gold; a home of villages and towns and wholesome simplicity and generous hospitality. And we of Oregon have come up and possessed part of this land. The doors of our State are open to the world and a vast procession is tending thitherward. Time and the race have so decreed. We can not call a halt if we would. In the next ten years towns will grow into cities; farms into towns; remote settlements into neighborhoods.