To believe that any form of power that tramples on these rights is unjust.

To believe that taxation without representation is tyranny, that government must rest upon the consent of the governed, 5 and that the people should choose their own ruler.

To believe not in a forced equality of conditions and estates, but in a true equalization of burdens, privileges, and opportunities.

To believe that the selfish interests of persons, classes, IO and sections must be subordinated to the welfare of the commonwealth.

To believe that union is as much a human necessity as liberty is a divine gift.

To believe, not that all people are good, but that the 15 way to make them better is to trust the whole people.

To believe that a free state should offer an asylum to the oppressed, and an example of virtue, sobriety, and fair dealing to all nations.

To believe that for the existence and perpetuity of such 20 a state a man should be willing to give his whole service, in property, in labor, and in life.

That is Americanism; an ideal embodying itself in a people; a creed heated white hot in the furnace of conviction and hammered into shape on the anvil of life; 25 a vision commanding men to follow it whithersoever it may lead them. And it was the subordination of the personal self to that ideal, that creed, that vision, which gave eminence and glory to Washington and the men who stood with him.

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THE ARISTOCRACY OF SERVICE

BY HENRY VAN DYKE. (SEPTEMBER, 1906)

WE believe that the liberties which the heroes of old won with blood and sacrifice are ours to keep with labor and service.

"All that our fathers wrought

With true prophetic thought,
Must be defended."

No privilege that encroaches upon those liberties is to be endured. No lawless disorder that imperils them is to 5 be sanctioned. No class that disregards or invades them is to be tolerated.

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There is a life that is worth living now, as it was worth living in the former days, and that is the honest life, the useful life, the unselfish life, cleansed by devotion to an 10 ideal. There is a battle that is worth fighting now, as it was worth fighting then, and that is the battle for justice and equality. To make our city and our State free in fact as well as in name; to break the rings that strangle real liberty, and to keep them broken; to cleanse, so far as in our power lies, the fountains of our national life from political, commercial, and social corruption; to teach our sons and daughters, by precept and example, the honor of serving such a country as America - that is work worthy of the finest manhood and womanhood. 20 The well born are those who are born to do that work. The well bred are those who are bred to be proud of that work. The well educated are those who see deepest into the meaning and the necessity of that work. Nor shall their labor be for naught, nor the reward of their sacrifice 25 fail them. For high in the firmament of human destiny are set the stars of faith in mankind, and unselfish courage, and loyalty to the ideal; and while they shine, the Americanism of Washington and the men who stood with him shall never, never die.

THE TYPICAL AMERICAN °

BY NICHOLAS MURRAY BUTLER. (1908)

THE typical American is he who, whether rich or poor, whether dwelling in the North, South, East, or West,

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whether scholar, professional man, merchant, manufacturer, farmer, or skilled worker for wages, lives the life of a good citizen and a good neighbor; who believes loyally and with all his heart in his country's institutions, and in 5 the underlying principles on which these institutions are built; who directs both his private and his public life by sound principles; who cherishes high ideals; and who aims to train his children for a useful life and for their country's service.

ΤΟ

OUR country is infinitely more than a domain affording to those who dwell upon it immense material advantages and opportunities. In such a country we live. But I love to think of a glorious nation built upon the will of free men, set apart for the propagation and cultivation of 15 humanity's best ideal of a free government, and made ready for the growth and fruitage of the highest aspirations of patriotism. This is the country that lives in us. I indulge in no mere figure of speech when I say that our nation, the immortal spirit of our domain, lives in us 20 in our hearts and minds and consciences. There it must find its nutriment or die. This thought more than any other presents to our minds the impressiveness and responsibility of American citizenship. The land we live in seems to be strong and active. But how fares the land that lives in us? Are we sure that we are doing all we ought to keep it in vigor and health? Are we keeping its roots well surrounded by the fertile soil of loving allegiance, and are we furnishing them the invigorating moisture of unselfish fidelity? Are we as diligent as we 30 ought to be to protect this precious growth against the poison that must arise from the decay of harmony and

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honesty and industry and frugality; and are we sufficiently watchful against the deadly, burrowing pests of consuming greed and cankerous cupidity? Our answers to these questions make up the account of our stewardship as keepers of a sacred trust.

THE ATTITUDE OF THE INDIVIDUAL IN
DEMOCRATIC GOVERNMENT •

BY CHARLES EVANS HUGHES. (1910)

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THE responsibilities of citizenship must not be regarded as limited to voting, to the use of electoral machinery, or to participation in political campaigns. Those are simply methods to secure the expression of public opinion which is the final authority. Opportunity and the re- 10 sponsibility which it measures, with respect to citizenship, are to be determined not merely by particular political rights, but by one's relation to the ultimate power which upholds or changes constitutions, makes laws, fixes the quality of administration and assures or prevents 15 progress.

The responsibilities of citizenship, then, embrace all those acts or possible acts, all those habits or attitudes, which express the totality of one's possible contributions to the formation of public opinion and to the maintenance 20 of proper standards of civic conduct. Power and responsibility are to be judged not by the single vote, but by the indefinable influence radiating from personality, varying with moral perception, knowledge, acumen, experience, and environment, and capable of being lessened 25 or increased, as one shrinks his individuality or expands his life and throws his full weight as a growing man of noble purpose into the civic scale.

Progress is not a blessing conferred from without. It merely expresses the gains of individual efforts in coun- 30

teracting the sinister and corrupting influences which, if successful, would make democratic institutions impossible. Gratifying as is the vast extent and variety of our accomplishment, one cannot be insensible to the 5 dangers to which we are exposed. No greater mistake can be made than to think that our institutions are fixed or may not be changed for the worse. We are a young nation and nothing can be taken for granted. If our institutions are maintained in their integrity, and if 10 change shall mean improvement, it will be because the intelligent and the worthy constantly generate the motive power which, distributed over a thousand lines of communication, develops that appreciation of the standards of decency and justice which we have delighted to call the 15 common sense of the American people.

Increasing prosperity tends to breed indifference and to corrupt moral soundness. Glaring inequalities in condition create discontent and strain the democratic relation. The vicious are the willing, and the ignorant 20 are the unconscious instruments of political artifice. Selfishness and demagoguery take advantage of liberty. The selfish hand constantly seeks to control government, and every increase of governmental power, even to meet just needs, furnishes opportunity for abuse and stimulates the effort to bend it to improper uses. Free speech voices the appeals of hate and envy as well as those of justice and charity. A free press is made the instrument of cunning, greed, and ambition, as well as the agency of enlightened and independent opinion. How shall we 30 preserve the supremacy of virtue and the soundness of the common judgment? How shall we buttress Democracy? The peril of this Nation is not in any foreign foe! We, the people, are its power, its peril, and its hope!

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I do not refer to the conventional attitude commonly assumed in American utterances and always taken on