.. Statim succurrit animo antiqua illa Romae condicio, cum non
tam propter singulos cives quam propter singulas gentes nomen
Romanum floreret. Cum enim civis alicujus et avum et proavum
principes civitatis esse creatos, cum patrem legationis munus apud
aulam Britannicam summa cum laude esse exsecutum cognovimus; cum
denique ipsum per totum bellum stipendia equo meritum, summa
pericula "Pulcra pro Libertate" ausum,... Romanae alicujus
gentis--Brutorum vel Deciorum--annales evolvere videmur, qui
testimonium adhibent "fortes creari fortibus," et majorum exemplis
et imaginibus nepotes ad virtutem accendi.
Is there any man so dull of soul as not to be stirred by that enumeration
of civic services zealously inherited; or is there any one so envious of
the past as not to believe that such memories should be honored in the
present as an incentive to noble emulation?
Well, we cannot all of us count Presidents and Ambassadors among our
ancestors, but we can, if we will, in the genealogy of the inner life
enroll ourselves among the adopted sons of a family in comparison with
which the Bruti and Decii of old and the Adamses of to-day are veritable
_new men_. We can see what defence against the meaner depredations of the
world may be drawn from the pride of birth, when, as it sometimes happens,
the obligation of a great past is kept as a contract with the present;
shall we forget to measure the enlargement and elevation of mind which
ought to come to a man who has made himself the heir of the ancient Lords
of Wisdom? "To one small people," as Sir Henry Maine has said, in words
often quoted, "it was given to create the principle of Progress.
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