since Auburn Prison was built; and while much of that interest will
of course evaporate, for we need not expect the millennium yet
awhile, nevertheless the ground has been tilled for the work that is
to come.

Then I dwelt upon the tasks which lay before us to do--before them and
before me. It was my task to go out in the world and help in the fight
against human servitude in the prisons, but they had a much harder task.

Your part is the most important of all. It is just to do your plain
duty here, day by day, in the same routine; but accepting each new
thing as it comes along and striving to make of that new thing a
success. Men, it is you alone who must do it. Nobody else can.

So then give to the Warden and to all the officers your hearty
support; aid in the endeavor to make this institution all that it
should be, all that it can be.

An old poet, Sir Richard Lovelace, once wrote:

"Stone walls do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage."

Last night perhaps I should not have altogether agreed with Sir
Richard; but of course what he meant was that, in spite of all the
bolts and bars which men can forge, the spirit is always free; that
you cannot imprison. In spite of your own confinement here you
possess after all the only true liberty that there is to be found
anywhere--the freedom of the spirit; the liberty to make yourselves
new men, advancing day by day toward the strength and the courage and
the faith which when you go out from these walls will enable you to
lead such a life that you will never come back.

In explaining why I could not go into particulars regarding any
conclusions I may have reached as to the Prison System, I realized that I
was on delicate ground. I was sorely tempted to relate some of my last
night's experiences in the jail, but I felt that were I to do so there was
no telling what the result might be. The men were strangely moved by the
whole situation, and I had the feeling that the room contained a great
deal of explosive material that a chance spark might ignite. So I bit my
lips, and forced myself away from the dangerous topic.

The time has not yet come for a statement of any particular
conclusions or ideas. My experience is so new--particularly some of
it--that I can hardly be expected just now to see things in their
right relations. I