and angry quarrels is undeniable. Party spirit in this country,
recalling old animosity, has always stigmatized with the English name
whatever it opposed. Every difference, every misunderstanding with
England has been ignobly turned to party account; but the two great
branches of this common race have come of age, and wherever they may
encounter a serious difficulty which must be accommodated they have but
to thrust demagogues aside, to recall the sublime words of Abraham
Lincoln, "With malice toward none, with charity for all," and in that
spirit, and in the spirit and the emotion represented in this country by
the gentlemen upon my right and my left, I make bold to say to Mr.
Chamberlain, in your name, there can be no misunderstanding which may
not be honorably and happily adjusted. For to our race, gentlemen of
both countries, is committed not only the defense, but the illustration
of constitutional liberty.

The question is not what we did a century ago, or in the beginning of
this century, with the lights that shone around us, but what is our duty
to-day, in the light which is given to us of popular government under
the republican form in this country, and the parliamentary form in
England.

If a sensitive public conscience, if general intelligence should not
fail to secure us from unnatural conflict, then liberty will not be
justified of her children, and the glory of the English-speaking race
will decline. I do not believe it. I believe that it is constantly
increasing, and that the colossal power which slumbers in the arms of a
kindred people will henceforth be invoked, not to drive them further
asunder, but to weld them more indissolubly together in the defense of
liberty under law.