century began the conquest and settlement of the island that was to
become their New England, they pushed out the Celts, the native
inhabitants of the island, just as their descendants, about twelve
hundred years later, were to push out the indigenous people of this
continent, to make way for a higher civilization, a larger
destiny. No Englishman ever saw an armed Roman in England, and
though traces of the Roman conquest may be seen everywhere in that
country to-day, it is sometimes forgotten that it was the Britain of
the Celts, not the England of the English, which was held for so
many centuries as a province of Rome.

The same love of freedom that resisted the Roman invasion in the
first home of the English was no less strong in their second home,
when Alfred with his brave yeomen withstood the invading Danes at
Ashdown and Edington, and saved England from becoming a Danish
province. It is true that the Normans, by one decisive battle,
placed a French king on the throne of England, but the English
spirit of freedom was never subdued; it rose superior to the
conquerors of Hastings, and in the end English speech and English
freedom gained the mastery.

The sacred flame of freedom has burned in the hearts of the
Anglo-Saxon race through all the centuries of our history, and this
spirit of freedom is reflected in our language and in our
oratory. There never have been wanting English orators when English
liberty seemed to be imperiled; indeed, it may be said that the
highest oratory has always been coincident with the deepest
aspirations of freedom.

It is said of Pitt,--the younger, I believe,--that he was fired to