What says Emerson: 

    “The lord is the peasant that was,
    The peasant the lord that shall be. 
    The lord is hay, the peasant grass,
    One dry and one the living tree.”

The purpose of our institutions is to manufacture manhood.

Make it impossible for the criminal and diseased, the vicious and the decadent, to come to us; bar out those who seek our country merely because they cannot subsist in their own, and you will find that the remainder of our immigrants are valuable additions to our populations.  Don’t despise these common people who come to us from other lands.

Don’t despise the common people anywhere on earth.  The Master did not go to the “first citizens” for His followers.  He selected the humblest.  He chose fishermen.  A promoter of a financial enterprise does not do this.  But the Saviour was not a promoter; He was teacher, reformer, Redeemer.

Then, too, consider our imperial location on the globe.  If all the minds of all the statesmen who ever lived were combined into one vast intellect of world-wisdom, and if this great composite brain should take an eternity to plan, it could not devise a land better located for power and world-dominance than the American Republic.

On the east is Europe, with an ocean between.  This ocean is a highway for commerce and a fluid fortress for defense, an open gateway of trade and a bulwark of peace.

On the west is the Orient, with its multitude of millions.  Between Asia and ourselves is again an ocean.  And again this ocean is an invitation to effort and a condition of safety.

The Republic is thus enthroned between the two great oceans of the world.  Its seat of power commands both Europe and Cathay.

On the north is slowly building a great people, developing a dominion as imperial as our own.  The same speech and blood of kinship make certain the ultimate union with our vital brothers across our northern frontier.

To the south is a group of governments over whom the sheer operation of natural forces is already establishing a sort of American oversight and suzerainty.

Mark, now, our harbors.  Behold how cunningly the Master Strategist has placed along our coasts great ports from which communication with the ends of earth naturally radiates.

Consider, too, the sweep of the ocean’s currents in relation to this country.  Observe the direction and effect of the Gulf Stream, and of the great current of the Pacific seas upon our coasts.  Follow on your map the direction of our rivers, and see how nicely Nature has designed the tracery of the Republic’s waterways.

In short, ponder over the incomparable position of this America of yours—­this home and country of yours—­on the surface of the globe.  When you think of it, not only will your mind be uplifted in pride, but you will sink to your knees in prayerful gratitude that the Father has given you such a land, with such opportunities, for your earthly habitation.