Page:The World's Famous Orations Volume 5.djvu/257

 MORLEY

tion in the political world as Holland and Switzerland. These musings of the moon do not take us far. The important thing, as we all know, is not the exact fraction of the human race that will speak English. The important thing is that those who speak English, whether in old lands or new, shall strive in lofty, generous and never- ceasing emulation with peoples of other tongues and other stock for the political, social, and in- tellectual primacy among mankind. In this noble strife for the service of our race we need never fear that claimants for the prize will be too large a multitude.

As an able scholar of your own has said, Jef- ferson was here using the old vernacular of Eng- lish aspirations after a free, manly, and well- ordered political life — a vernacular rich in stately tradition and noble phrase, to be found in a score of a thousand of champions in many camps — in Buchanan, Milton, Hooker, Locke, Jeremy Tay- lor, Roger Williams, and many another humbler but not less strenuous pioneer and confessor of freedom. Ah, do not fail to count up, and count up often, what a different world it would have been but for that island in the distant northern sea! These were the tributary fountains, that, as time went on, swelled into the broad confluence of modern time. What was new in 1776 was the transformation of thought into actual polity.

What is progress? It is best to be slow in tin 1 complex arts of politics in their widest sense, and not to hurry to define. If you want a platitude, 219

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