s world has ordained
that his children may work out their own salvation and that
his nations may work out their own salvation by obedience
to his laws without any dictation or coercion from any other.
I believe that liberty, good government, free institutions,
cannot be given by any one people to any other, but must
be wrought out for each by itself, slowly, painfully, in the
process of years or centuries, as the oak adds ring to ring.
I believe that a Republic is greater than an Empire. I believe
that the moral law and the Golden Rule are for nations as
well as for individuals. I believe in George Washington,
not in Napoleon Bonaparte; in the Whigs of the Revolutionary
day, not in the Tories; the Chatham, Burke, and Sam Adams,
not in Dr. Johnson or Lord North. I believe that the North
Star, abiding in its place, is a greater influence in the
Universe than any comet or meteor. I believe that the United
States when President McKinley was inaugurated was a greater
world power than Rome in the height of her glory or even England
with her 400,000,000 vassals. I believe, finally, whatever
clouds may darken the horizon, that the world is growing better,
that to-day is better than yesterday, and to-morrow will be
better than to-day."

CHAPTER XL
EDWARD EVERETT HALE

To give a complete and truthful account of my own life, the
name of Edward Everett Hale should appear on almost every
page. I became a member of his parish in Worcester in August,
1849. Wherever I have been, or wherever he has been, I have
been his parishioner ever since. I do not undertake to speak
of him at length not only because he is alive, but because
his countrymen know him through and through, almost as well
as I do.

He has done work of the first quality in a great variety
of fields. In each he has done work enough to fill the life
and to fill the measure of fame of a busy and successful man.
I have learned of him the great virtue of Hope; to judge
of mankind by their merits and not their faults; to understand
that the great currents of history, especially in a republic,
more especially in our Republic, are determined by great and
noble motives and not by mean and base motives.

In his very best work Dr. Hale seems always to be doing and
saying what he does and says extempore, without premeditation.
Where he gets the time to acquire his vast stores of knowledge,
or to think the thoughts we all like to hear, nobody can tell.
When he sp