Our own rights as a
Nation, the liberties, the privileges, and the property of our people
have been profoundly affected. We are not mere disconnected lookers-on.
The longer the war lasts, the more deeply do we become concerned that
it should be brought to an end and the world be permitted to resume its
normal life and course again. And when it does come to an end we shall
be as much concerned as the nations at war to see peace assume an aspect
of permanence, give promise of days from which the anxiety of
uncertainty shall be lifted, bring some assurance that peace and war
shall always hereafter be reckoned part of the common interest of
mankind. We are participants, whether we would or not, in the life of
the world. The interests of all nations are our own also. We are
partners with the rest. What affects mankind is inevitably our affair as
well as the affair of the nations of Europe and of Asia.
One observation on the causes of the present war we are at liberty to
make, and to make it may throw some light forward upon the future, as
well as backward upon the past. It is plain that this war could have
come only as it did, suddenly and out of secret counsels, without
warning to the world, without discussion, without any of the deliberate
movements of counsel with which it would seem natural to approach so
stupendous a contest.
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