If in disparagement of our modesty, yet in recognition of our gratitude,
the delegates from the United States have just requested me to express
our profound appreciation of the extraordinary courtesy you have
extended to our country in the person of her distinguished and able
Secretary of State, whose wise and exalted address we have all heard
with delight and satisfaction.
However, the honors you have paid him, and which come so graciously from
a polite and hospitable people, convey a deeper meaning, for in them we
must see a gratifying evidence of that American solidarity which unites
our republics in the common development of popular government, energized
by liberty, illumined by intelligence, steadied by order, and sustained
by virtue. The liberty of law, and the opportunity for duty, and the
dignity of responsibility come to us by the very genius of our
institutions. Therefore, in recognition of the fraternity which inspires
the greatest tasks which have yet fallen to the lot of so many peoples,
working together for a common end, we receive your compliment to our
country, and for this purpose I have thus detained you to hear this
imperfect expression of our thanks.