Remember that after the war has begun it is too late to improvise a navy.

That is the spirit of devotion to the flag and the country, and to one's fellows which the United States navy develops.

I have not got much to say to you, because since I have been in California I have felt a good deal more like learning than teaching.

When 1898 came and the war which President McKinley in all honesty and in all sincerity sought to avoid became inevitable, and was pressed upon him, he met it as he and you had met the crisis of 1861.

None of the men of my own generation or of this younger, stand as close to me as you of my regiment, as the men of the Spanish War do,

It is not too much to say that no man since Lincoln was as widely and as universally beloved in this country as was President McKinley.

I thank you for coming here and for giving me the privilege of joining with you today in these solemn ceremonies of commemoration.

Far better is it to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure... than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in a gray twilight that knows not victory…

For that reason I hail with especial pleasure the existence of such societies as those which seek to band together the young men and young women native born to this State.

I guess you do not wonder that I am fond of the men of my regiment.

The pioneer days have gone, but the need for the old pioneer virtues remains as great as ever.

This is a government of freemen

I think it is getting to be fairly understood that that is our foreign policy.

I have never tasted, not even at the wonderful banquet that I have attended in San Francisco, anything quite so good.

Let us speak courteously, deal fairly, and keep ourselves armed and ready.

I most earnestly hope that this work will ever be of a peaceful character

I believe in children

I want to thank you and my comrades of the Spanish-American War from my heart;

Proud of your State? Of course you are proud of your State.

I am deeply touched by the beautiful gift you have given me.

I trust I came within them a fairly good American, and I leave them a better American.

I should be sorry indeed if there were not societies like those of the Native Sons and Native Daughters in this State to keep alive the sense of historic continuity with the State's mighty past.

San Francisco is not on the westernmost verge of our possessions.

With decency there must go the power practically to apply it in life, practically to work it out, and to work it out for the benefit of others as well as for one's self.

I have enjoyed being in California for the last week, and it has been the greatest possible pleasure.