EIGHT hundred years before Christ, the prophet of God, looking forward to this very time, told us what potent cry would go forth "among the nations:" "Prepare war; stir up the mighty men; let all the men of war draw near, let them come up. Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruning-hooks into spears: let the weak say, I am strong. . . . Let the nations bestir themselves." See Joel 3:9-14. The nations are bestirring themselves. England is building more ships. All other nations are equipping themselves. President Roosevelt thus speaks for the United States, in a message to Congress, under date of April 14: "It is mischievous folly for any statesman to assume that this world has yet reached the stage, or has come within measurable distance of the stage, when a proud nation, jealous of its honor and conscious of its great mission in the world, can be content to rely for peace upon the forbearance of other powers. "For centuries China has cultivated the very spirit which our own peace-at-any-price men wish this country to adopt. For centuries China has refused to provide military forces, and has treated the soldier as an inferior. "In external affairs the policy has resulted in various other nations now holding large portions of Chinese territory, while there is a very acute fear in China lest the empire, because of its defenselessness, be exposed to absolute dismemberment and its well-wishers are able to hold it only in a small measure because no nation can help at once unless that other can help itself. "The State Department is continually appealed to to interfere on behalf of peoples and nationalities who insist that they are suffering from oppression—now Jews in one country, now Christians in another, now black men said to be oppressed by white men in Africa, Armenians, Koreans, Finns, Poles, representatives of all, appeal at times to this government. "When a nation is so happily situated as ours—that is, when it has no reason to fear or to be feared by its land neighbors—the fleet is all the more necessary for the preservation of peace. The United States can hope for a permanent career of peace on only one condition, and that is, on condition of building and maintaining a first-class navy. "There is rank due to the United States among nations which will be withheld, if not lost, by the reputation of weakness. If we desire to avoid insult, we must be able to repel it; if we desire to secure peace,—one of the most powerful instruments of our rising prosperity,—it must be known that we are at all times ready for war."
(Signed) "THEODORE ROOSEVELT." With these words Governor Gillette welcomed the fleet at San Diego, April 14: "We appreciate our navy because we know that the men behind the guns are made up of brain and brawn and patriotism, and some day you will be called upon to exercise those sterling qualities to the fullest. To-day you have come into this beautiful bay of the Pacific and you find it calm and serene; it speaks for peace. But soon, perhaps, not in a few years, maybe, but some time, there will occur in this ocean the greatest naval war in the history of the world. It is coming, and the great powers of the world are striving to make their strength the greatest possible in this ocean. We shall be called upon to protect and extend our commerce with the force of our navy, and then it will be that the boys behind the guns will count."