Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 6.djvu/177

Rh This greatest of all opportunities was the providential favor Washington recognized; and he did not fail to point out the awful responsibility arising from it when he said: “The preservation of the sacred fire of liberty and the destiny of the republican model of government are justly considered as deeply, perhaps as finally, staked on the experiment intrusted to the hands of the American people.” And the manner in which he thought that this our great opportunity should be turned to the benefit of mankind, he forcibly indicated by expressing, in his Farewell Address, his ardent wish

that the happiness of these States, under the auspices of liberty, may be made so complete, by so careful a preservation and so prudent a use of this blessing, as will acquire to them the glory of recommending it to the applause, the affection and the adoption of every nation which is as yet a stranger to it.

And further:

Observe good faith and justice towards all nations; cultivate peace and harmony with all; religion and morality enjoin this conduct, and can it be that good policy does not equally enjoin it? It will be worthy of a free, enlightened and, at no distant day, a great nation, to give to mankind the magnanimous and too-novel example of a people always guided by an exalted justice and benevolence.

Thus did Washington view the first providential favor bestowed upon this people, and also our duty to spread this blessing among the nations, not by the force of arms, but by the moral power of example.

The second was no less extraordinary, although Washington himself would have been too modest to avow it. It consisted in the fact that the first President of this Republic furnished in himself, by his character, the principles he followed, the motives that inspired him and the