tion. I maintain that an
oppressed people are authorized, whenever they can, to rise and
break their fetters. This was the great principle of the English
revolution. It was the great principle of our own. Spanish-America
has been doomed for centuries to the practical effects of an odious
tyranny. If we were justified, she is more than justified. I am no
propagandist. I would not seek to force upon other nations our
principles and our liberty, if they do not want them. But if an
abused and oppressed people will their freedom; if they seek to
establish it; if, in truth, they have established it, we have a
right, as a sovereign power, to notice the fact, and to act as
circumstances and our interest require. I will say in the language
of the venerated father of my country, 'born in a land of liberty,
my anxious recollections, my sympathetic feelings, and my best
wishes, are irresistibly excited, whensoever, in any country, I see
an oppressed nation unfurl the banners of freedom.'"

This same spirit loosed the tongue of Wendell Phillips to plead the
cause of the enslaved African in words that burned into the hearts
of his countrymen. It emboldened George William Curtis to assert the
right to break the shackles of party politics and follow the
dictates of conscience:--

"I know,--no man better,--how hard it is for earnest men to
separate their country from their party, or their religion from
their sect. But, nevertheless, the welfare of the country is dearer
than the mere victory of party, as truth is more precious than the
interest of any sect. You will hear this patriotism scorned as an
impracticable theory, as the dream of a cloister, as the whim of a
fool. But such was the folly of the Spartan Leonidas, staying with
his three hundred the Persian horde, and teaching Greece the
self-reliance that saved her. Such was the folly of the Swiss Arnold
von Winkelried, gathering into his own breast the points of Austrian
spears, making his dead body the bridge of victory for his
countrymen. Such was the folly of the American Nathan Hale, gladly
risking the seeming disgrace of his name, and grieving that be had
but one life to give for his country. Such are the beacon-lights of
a pure patriotism that burn forever in men's memories and answer
each other through the illuminated ages."

So long as there are wrongs to be redressed, so long as the strong
oppress the weak, so long as injustice sits in high places, the