But after you have traveled all over the earth; after you have seen
Teutonic system made ten times more perfect in Japan and Slav patience
outdone in China--in short, after you circle the globe and sojourn
among its peoples, you will come home a living, breathing, thinking
Fourth of July.
Of course I do not mean that we are perfect--we are still crude; or
that we have not made mistakes--we have rioted in error; or that other
nations cannot teach us something--we can learn greatly from them, and
we will. But this is the point as it affects you, young man: Among all
the uncounted millions of human beings on this earth, none has the
opportunities to make the most of life that the young American has.
No government now existing or described by history gives you such
liberty of effort, or scatters before and around you such chances. No
soil now occupied by any separate nation is so bountiful or
resourceful. No other people have our American unwearied spirit of
youth. The composite brain of no other nation yeasts in thought and
ideas like the combined intellect of the American millions.
For, look you, our institutions invite every man to do his best. There
is positively no position which a man of sufficient mind, energy, and
character cannot obtain, no reward he cannot win.
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