Mr. Baldwin's speech at a meeting of the Empire and
Canadian Clubs before the opening of the Bridge was a model of high thinking. It was spiritual force, he said, which made men ready to give up comfort at home in order to bring forward the backward parts of the world. It was " not enough to concentrate on money-making." The English intelligence was apt to be despised by quick-witted nations, but our most valuable "real estate " —a phrase which must have gone home to a Canadian audience—was character, composed of steadiness, integrity, and a capacity for toleration which sometimes took the form of a humorous boredom. The task was to preserve democracy, and that was possible only by education not so much in letters as in moral truth. So long as Ameri- cans and Englishmen spoke the same speech, and obeyed the same God and the same laws, they would remain one people. At the actual opening of the Bridge, Mr. Baldwin referred indirectly to Geneva, when he said : " We differ for the moment, but we know in our hearts that this does not affect our friendship." Again, he said : " The first task of the statesman, as of the bridge-builder, is to lay his foundation securely."
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