n endurance, but not in resistance; therefore
they have been subdued by strangers. Their history is a repetition of
that of Babylon. A nation from afar came with speed swiftly, and none
stumbled, or slept, or slumbered, but they brought desolation upon the
land, and took the stay and the staff from the people, the whole stay
of bread, and the whole stay of water, the mighty man, and the man of
war, the judge, and the prophet, and the prudent, and the ancient, and
none delivered them. Woe, indeed, is the heritage of those who walk
sad-thoughted and downcast through this radiant, soul-delighting
earth, blind to its beauty and deaf to its music, and of those who
call evil good, and good evil, and put darkness for light, and light
for darkness.

What care the weather-bronzed sons of the West, feeding the world
from the plains of Dakota, for the Omars and the Brahmins? They would
say to the Hindoos, "Blot out your philosophy, dead for a thousand
years, look with fresh eyes at Reality and Life, put away your
Brahmins and your crooked gods, and seek diligently for Vishnu the
Preserver."

Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement; nothing can be done
without hope. When our forefathers laid the foundation of the American
commonwealths, what nerved them to their task but a vision of a free
community? Against the cold, inhospitable sky, across the wilderness
white with snow, where lurked the hidden savage, gleamed the bow of
promise, toward which they set their faces with the faith that levels
mountains, fills up valleys, bridges rivers and carries civilization
to the uttermost parts of the earth. Although the pioneers could not
build according to the Hebraic ideal they saw, yet they gave the
pattern of all that is most enduring in our country to-day. They
brought to the wilderness the thinking mind, the printed book, the
deep-rooted desire for self-government and the English common law that
judges alike the king and the subject, the law on which rests the
whole structure of our society.

It is significant that the foundation of that law is optimistic. In
Latin countries the court proceeds with a pessimistic bias. The
prisoner is held guilty until he is proved innocent. In England and
the United States there is an optimistic presumption that the accused
is innocent until it is no longer possible to deny his guilt. Under
our system, it is said, many criminals are acquitted; but it is surely
better so than that many innoce