Did that Indian warrior who met Lafayette in the American wilderness speak more wisely than he knew? Were the footsteps of this soldier of France directed by the Great Spirit? Who can tell!

This must be the last war. We shall not hand down to our children this heritage of calamity. Our Revolutionary War settled for all time the independence of these United States of America. The Civil War settled for all time the question of slavery in this hemisphere. This war must and shall settle for all time the question of military autocratic domination of the world. “The time has come to conquer or submit.”

And if after we have checked and curbed this natural foe to liberty there shall arise a concert of the powers of the world, a world-wide union to insure and enforce future peace, a union based not merely on treaty obligations which may be avoided, or on a contract which may be broken, but on a wide understanding and realization that organized democracy must in the future act concertedly as the police of the world then by just so much as we make posterity safe, the awful sacrifice will not have been made in vain.

We build for posterity. “Cur non?” “Why not?” It is the spirit of Lafayette that calls. And with the call we hear from the heavens the chant of a mighty chorus, singing not the hymn of hate but the pæan of peace on earth, good-will toward men.

Those who do not know us gibe at us and throw our sins in our teeth. But this mightiest of democracies is at last awakening, is casting out the evil genii of opulence, is girding on its sword for the great work. Soldier of freedom, thou camest to us in the time of our greatest need. “Now,” thou saidst, “is precisely the moment to serve your cause.” Symbol of the united democracies of the world, symbol of a union which will make the earth safe for its peoples, symbol of a union of peace, we are led by thy spirit. We fight for democracy; we build for posterity.

And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not; for it was founded upon a rock.