Page:The World's Famous Orations Volume 10.djvu/267

 HAY

whom wrong or injustice was impossible ; of mod- erate fortune, whose slender means nobody could envy. They were men of austere virtue, of tender heart, of eminent abilities, which they had devoted with single minds to the good of the Republic. If ever men walked before God and man without blame, it was these three rulers of our people. The only temptation to attack their lives offered was their gentle radiance, — to eyes hating the light, that was oifence enough.

The stupid uselessness of such an infamy af- fronts the common sense of the world. One can conceive how the death of a dictator may change the political conditions of an empire; how the extinction of a narrowing line of kings may bring in an alien dynasty. But in a well-ordered Republic like ours the ruler may fall, but the State feels no tremor. Our beloved and revered leader is gone — but the natural process of our laws provides us a successor, identical in purpose and ideals, nourished by the same teachings, inspired by the same principles, pledged by tender affection as well as by high loyalty to carry to completion the immense task committed to his hands, and to smite with iron severity every manifestation of that hideous crime which his mild predecessor, with his dying breath, for- gave. The sayings of celestial wisdom have no date ; the words that reach us, over two thousand years, out of the darkest hour of gloom the world has ever kno^vn, are true to life to-day: "They know not what they do." The blow struck at

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