They
call to us to say what it is that we desire, in what, if in anything,
our purpose and our spirit differ from theirs; and I believe that the
people of the United States would wish me to respond, with utter
simplicity and frankness. Whether their present leaders believe it or
not, it is our heartfelt desire and hope that some way may be opened
whereby we may be privileged to assist the people of Russia to attain
their utmost hope of liberty and ordered peace.
It will be our wish and purpose that the processes of peace, when they
are begun, shall be absolutely open and that they shall involve and
permit henceforth no secret understandings of any kind. The day of
conquest and aggrandizement is gone by; so is also the day of secret
covenants entered into in the interest of particular governments and
likely at some unlooked-for moment to upset the peace of the world. It
is this happy fact, now clear to the view of every public man whose
thoughts do not still linger in an age that is dead and gone, which
makes it possible for every nation whose purposes are consistent with
justice and the peace of the world to avow now or at any other time the
objects it has in view.
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