ADDRESS ON THE OCCASION OF HIS VISIT TO THE SOLDIERS' HOME TO THE CITIZENS OF BATH 

FEBRUARY 9, 1899

MR. CHAIRMAN, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: 

I am glad to have the chance of meeting you even for so brief a time to-day. 
It is more than a pleasure. I only wish that it lay in my power 
to talk at length to you.

I feel a double pleasure in coming to see you; first, because having
been honored by being made the executive of this State, 
I have tried and shall try, according as it is given me to see my duty, and do
it on behalf of all, whether they stood with me or against me; and in
the next place, gentlemen, because it is peculiarly fitting that I should
have the chance to say a word to you who have in your limits a
building consecrated to the latter lives of the men who fought in the
great war, to keep the flag whole and without a stain. At this time,
when that flag, the flag of the newest nation, of the youngest nation,
of the youngest continent, is being carried in triumph through the
lands of the Eastern sea, we have all of us, particularly good
Americans felt, our hearts thrill at the news of what has been done by
our soldiers on the extreme opposite side of the earth— soldiers who,
having driven out tyranny, are now doing their duty by seeing that the
lands which have been relieved from that tyranny shall not go beck
into savagery. The last year has been a year full of fate for America,
and every American citizen can hold his head a little higher because of
what has been done by our statesmen, our soldiers, our captains and
our men of might, on land and on the high seas, during the year of
1898. We hold a better position abroad, we stand better, all of us,
because of the valor that has been displayed, for that valor reflected
honor not merely upon those who showed it, but upon all American
citizens.


All of us stand or fall together. No deed of corruption or infamy is
performed in public or private life, but all of us are so much the
poorer. I wish that we could recognize even more clearly than we do,
that every act of municipal or State or national misgovernment, that
every conspicuous act of dishonesty, takes away by just so much from
that American character in which we have the right to take pride; 
and that so, on the other hand, every act of military
or civic virtue, every deed of courage of soldiers, of good conduct in
our men of public affairs, reflects honor upon the people as a whole. It
is important that we shall have material well being; it is important that
we should have material prosperity; it is more important that we shall
have that upon which ultimately, material well being must rest, that
we shall have the moral well being, that we shall feel that moral lift
toward things higher, for the lack of which nothing else can atone,
either in the life of a nation or in the life of an individual. We are
ending this century; we are about to enter upon another, increasing the
range of our responsibilities. If we are indeed the nation we claim to
be, that will not make us shrink from the future. If we are, indeed, as
we claim to be, the men who stand foremost in the ranks to-day, the
nation that is entitled to take the lead in shaping the progress of the
world, we will not shrink from the duty that is before us, we will not
shrink from doing great things merely because thereby we entail upon
ourselves great responsibilities. No great victory was ever won save
by those who were willing to take some risk in winning it, and this
applies not only our military life, but to our civil life.
We must uphold the honor of the nation abroad, and we cannot
ultimately do it if we do not uphold the cause of civic honesty at
home. You have a right to demand in your public servants that they
shall serve the public with an eye single to their duty, and in return
any public servant striving to do his duty has a right to ask of you that
you uphold him in so doing, no matter what your particular politics
may be.

Now, gentlemen, I am glad to have had the honor and the pleasure
of being present to-day. I want to assure you how much pleased I have
been, not merely at coming here to see the Home, in which the
veterans who worked and fought and suffered for four long years that
followed the firing on Sumter, are now passing the last days of their
lives, but to have the chance of seeing you of this town and this
country. Just one personal allusion before I close. I have not had the
chance since I have been inaugurated as Governor of meeting face to
face the men who were responsible for my being Governor, because it
is you who are so—(Applause)—because I owe my position to you of
the country districts and the smaller towns, and I appreciate what I
owe you and shall strive to show you that I do appreciate it.