they ever been more fitted than to this. For, my
friends, we know that it _is_ a dictate of our nature to magnify that
which is our own. However insignificant it really is, man spreads an
ideal glory over the land of his birth. Perhaps its historical
importance compensates for its geographical narrowness, or its material
poverty is hidden by its intellectual wealth. From its stock of mighty
men--its heroes, and bards, and sages--who have brightened the roll of
fame; or from its memorable battle-fields, on rude heath and in mountain
defile; or from its achievements which have swelled the tides of human
enterprise, and made the world its debtor; he draws the inspiration, he
carries away the conviction of greatness--so that wherever its emblems
come before his eyes, they touch the deep springs of reverence and
pride. Nor let us condemn this feeling as merely a selfish and
exaggerating one. This spirit of nationality exists for wise purposes,
embosoms the richest elements of loyalty and faith, and is one of those
profound _sentiments_ of our nature that cannot be driven out by any
process of logic.

But, if a nation really inherits the description in the text, it must
possess something more than an illustrious history and an ideal glory.
We must determine its greatness by its symbols; yet these must be not
merely signs of things, but instruments of achievement; not merely the
illustrations of dead works or patriotic enthusiasm, but the agents of
actual power and of living performance. Now, in looking over the world
at the present time, there are other nations to which the words of
Joshua might be applied as well as to our own, and with as little
assumption of national vanity. Other people are great and have great
power, by virtue of political importance, vast possessions, and strong
institutions. To say nothing of the rest, consider that huge domain
which at this hour confronts the troubled principalities of Europe. It
stretches itself out over three continents. The waves of three oceans
chafe against its shaggy sides. The energies of innumerable tribes are
throbbing in its breast. It clasps regions yet raw in history as well as
those that are grey with tradition, and incloses in one empire the bones
of the Siberian mammoth and the valleys of Circassian flowers. And it is
great not only by geographical extent, but by political purpose--great
by the idea which is involved with its destiny--an idea austere as the
climate, tre