upon me by nominating me as
President. I cannot accept it at this time. I do not know the attitude
of the candidate of the Republican party toward the vital questions of
the day. Therefore, if you desire an immediate decision, I must decline
the nomination.

"But if you prefer to wait, I suggest that my conditional refusal to
run be placed in the hands of the Progressive National Committee. If
Mr. Hughes's statements, when he makes them, shall satisfy the committee
that it is for the interest of the country that he be elected, they can
act accordingly and treat my refusal as definitely accepted.

"If they are not satisfied, they can so notify the Progressive party,
and at the same time they can confer with me, and then determine on
whatever action we may severally deem appropriate to meet the needs of
the country.

"THEODORE ROOSEVELT."

Puzzled, disheartened, overwhelmed, the Progressive delegates went
away. They could not then see how wise, how farsighted, how inevitable
Roosevelt's decision was. Some of them will never see it. Probably few
of them as they went out of those doors realized that they had taken
part in the last act of the romantic and tragic drama of the National
Progressive party. But such was the fact, for the march of events was
too much for it. Fate, not its enemies, brought it to an end.

So was born, lived a little space, and died the Progressive party. At
its birth it caused the nomination, by the Democrats, and the election,
by the people, of Woodrow Wilson. At its death it brought about the
nomination of Charles E. Hughes by the Republicans. It forced the
writing into the platforms of the more conservative parties of
principles and programmes of popular rights and social regeneration.
The Progressive party never attained to power, but it wielded a potent
power. It was a glorious failure.

CHAPTER XV. THE FIGHTING EDGE

Theodore Roosevelt was a prodigious coiner of phrases. He added scores
of them, full of virility, picturesqueness, and flavor to the every-day
speech of the American people. They stuck, because they expressed ideas
that needed expressing and because they expressed them so well that no
other combinations of words could quite equal them. One of the best,
though not the most popular, of his phrases is contained in the
following quotation:

"One of the prime dangers of civilization has always been its tendency
to cause the loss of virile fighting virtues, of the fighting