society, yield obedience to that power as readily as if it were a monarch with soldiers and jailers at his heels. Indeed, the moral courage of conviction against adverse currents is the most necessary, but, I apprehend, not the most general of civic virtues. Those who know our friend here as well as I do will agree with me that he possesses that civic virtue in a rare degree, and may emphatically be called a man never afraid, a man of that grim independence which is bent upon thinking right and doing right, no matter what others may think or do. There has hardly been an earnest effort for the enforcement of correct principles of government, or for the vindication of justice and right, or against evil practices or demoralizing tendencies in our public concerns, since Dr. Jacobi became a citizen of this Republic, that he did not vigorously support in his effective, although quiet and unpretentious way, no matter whether other people liked it or not, or what it might cost him. I need not go into detail and tell of his services as a member of the famous Committee of Seventy, or as a co-worker with the Chamber of Commerce in cholera times, and in various other ways which, although equally, if not even more meritorious, have never come to public notice. Moreover, he was not only animated with a warm enthusiasm for high ideals and the accomplishment of important public objects, but also with that healthy righteous wrath which abhors and attacks not only sin in the abstract, but the sinner in the concrete-a wrath far more wholesome to a democracy like ours than that facile and pliable tolerance which holds that sin is bad, to be sure, but that to disturb a sinner of respectable position would be to indulge in ungenteel personalities. As in the realm of science he has always been the personification of scientific conscience, so in the realm of civic duty he has always been the personification of civic conscience, not one of those optimists who always comfort themselves with the belief that everything, however bad, will come right without a struggle; nor one of those pessimists who, whenever anything goes wrong, give up everything as lost, and whine that further effort is useless but a sturdy patriot who, whatever discouragements there be, never despairs of the Republic, and remains ever ready to do his best and to sacrifice without counting, and to stand in the breach. In him we see one of the adopted citizens whose peculiar patriotism is not always quite understood and appreciated by our native friends. It may strike some of you as somewhat audacious when I say that the adopted citizen may in a certain sense be a more jealously patriotic American than the native. And yet it is true. The adopted citizen usually preserves a certain sentimental and reverential attachment to the country of his birth. But just because of this many of them are especially anxious to see the country of their adoption, by its virtues and the high character of its achievements, justify their separation from their native land, and enable them to point with just pride to the choice they have made. They may for this very reason, when they see the character of their adopted country put in jeopardy, or its good name in the family of nations endangered, resent this and stand up for the cause of right and of integrity and of honor in their adopted country, with an intensity of feeling even greater than that which ordinarily animates the native. Neither is it always a mere necessity or an interest that keeps the adopted citizen here. Full of attractions and of opportunity though this country may be, it may happen that material interest or legitimate ambition suggests a return to the native land; and of fidelity to the adopted country, with which such temptations are sometimes resisted, Dr. Jacobi has furnished a striking example. Any man of science would consider it a high honor to be called to a professor's chair in one of the great universities of Germany. But when, some years ago, Dr. Jacobi received an intimation that such a position in the greatest of them all was open to him, he subdued the pride he might have felt in appearing in the same country, in which he had adorned a political prisoner's cell, now crowned with high distinction, and he promptly resolved that, having cast his lot with this Republic, here he would stay. Surely his title to American citizenship, and to the name of a patriotic American could not be more complete. I feel now that I ought to stop, out of regard for his feelings; for if I were to say all that I know of him as his old and intimate friend, I might too severely shock his modesty, as he shocked mine on a similar occasion a year ago. But, after all, I find no fault with him for that; for there can hardly be a more wholesome and comfortable institution among men than a firmly established, well regulated, honest and steadfast mutual admiration society. And if by this time you have concluded that my friend Dr. Jacobi and myself have formed such a club of two, and find no end of satisfaction and pleasure in it, I shall not demur. I might even reveal some of the secret details of the comforts of our companionship, and say that frequently, when we had written something for publication or in print, or for delivery in speech, we read it to one another before it came out. You will admit that a friendship which has for many years endured like this can endure anything. To be sure, the ordeal was mitigated by the fact that we not only did not bore one another in that way, but we rather enjoyed it; for we always, reciprocally, found our productions quite excellent, whatever others might think of them. I trust my friend will pardon me for taking unusual liberties with him in such public revelations of private intercourse, for these are liberties which without offense may be taken by an older man with one so much younger. To conclude, for fifty years I have loved him and been proud of him as a man of science of whom I know how learned, how conscientious, how indefatigable, how helpful and how justly renowned he is; as a citizen of whom I know how patriotic, how courageous, how unselfish and how public spirited he is; and as a friend whose nobility of heart only those can cherish and esteem as it deserves who know him best. And I can hardly describe how profoundly happy I am to be permitted to take part in this tribute which so many of the best men of the country are here assembled to pay to such genuine, sterling and eminent worth. TO EDWIN BURRITT SMITH BOLTON LANDING, LAKE GEORGE, N. Y., I received your letter of the 5th with the call for the "Liberty Congress" [at Indianapolis], last night. I think the call is well expressed as it stands. To judge from what I read in the papers and in my correspondence, and from what I hear in conversation, the action of the Democratic Convention has produced the worst possible impression. The fight about the free-coinage plank in the Committee and the subsequent adoption of it has pushed the silver question into the foreground again and given it much more prominence than it would have had, if the resolution had not been discussed at all. I think if the election were to take place within a week, McKinley would have an overwhelming success. Friends of mine right here, who had reconciled themselves to the support of Bryan on the ground that imperialism could not be defeated in any other way, are now as profoundly disgusted with the Democrats as they were in 1896. I have no doubt that this feeling is widespread among people who otherwise agree with us on the matter of imperialism. When I spoke to you about the possible necessity of a third ticket, it was in anticipation of such a state of things. I would now ask you to consider whether it will not be our best policy at the Liberty Congress to strike out boldly for a new party. There is a very widespread feeling that the people have permitted themselves long enough, and too long, to be forced by two rotten old party carcasses to choose between two evils. Is it not possible that this sentiment would give a strong and hearty response to a trumpet call for emancipation from this disgraceful serfdom, and that a new organization so created might not only attract the Republican anti-imperialists from the support of McKinley, but also become strong enough to live? Please think of this, consult about it with your friends in Chicago and inform me of your conclusions. The developments of the campaign may indeed put a new face on things before we meet on August 15th. But at present the situation looks desperate. If it does not improve through the action of other causes, a bold step and a striking appeal such as I have suggested may redeem it. I enclose a short list of names to whom invitations might be addressed. TO EDWIN BURRITT SMITH BOLTON LANDING, N. Y., Your letter of the 4th inst. reached me yesterday. Accept my sincere thanks for your words of sympathy. You knew my boy well enough to appreciate how hard the blow was.' • His son Herbert, the youngest of his four children, born in March, 1876, had died when travelling in England. |