It is a distressing and oppressive duty, Gentlemen of the Congress,
which I have performed in thus addressing you. There are, it may be,
many months of fiery trial and sacrifice ahead of us. It is a fearful
thing to lead this great peaceful people into war, into the most
terrible and disastrous of all wars, civilization itself seeming to be
in the balance. But the right is more precious than peace, and we shall
fight for the things which we have always carried nearest our
hearts,--for democracy, for the right of those who submit to authority
to have a voice in their own governments, for the rights and liberties
of small nations, for a universal dominion of right by such a concert of
free peoples as shall bring peace and safety to all nations and make the
world itself at last free. To such a task we can dedicate our lives and
our fortunes, everything that we are and everything that we have, with
the pride of those who know that the day has come when America is
privileged to spend her blood and her might for the principles that gave
her birth and happiness and the peace which she has treasured. God
helping her, she can do no other.
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