hooks. But as sad and as disappointing as it is, we have to acknow-
ledge that this day has not yet arrived. We know with certainty that
our hope for a lasting peace with justice in this troubled world depends
upon our remaining strong. We know also that this hope will vanish
if we ever allow ourselves to sink into a position of weakness before
an enemy that is as cruel and ruthless as it is cunning and powerful.

It is in no sense strange that so many persons have spoken and
written the same sentiments when called upon to express appropriate
remarks about the dead of our wars. General James A. Garfield, who
later became President of the United State, had this to say at a
memorial to the dead in Arlington cemetery: "If silence is golden, "
he said, "it must be here beside the graves of the men whose lives
were more significant than speech and whose death was a poem the
music of which can never be sung. "

In these words, he was echoing an even greater and more moving
speech — by President Lincoln when the battlefield at Gettysburg
was dedicated as a national cemetery. "But in a larger sense, " said
President Lincoln, "we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we
cannot hallow the ground. The brave men, living and dead, who
struggled here have consecrated it far above our poor power to add
or detract. The world will little not nor long remember what we say
here, but it can never forget what they did here. "

We cannot, then, do appropriate honor to these brave men with
words alone. We can, as we are doing here today, honor them with
appropriate fanfare and ceremony. We can decorate their graves with
flowers, in reverent testimony that the ravages of time will not erase
from our memories the sacrifices they made that our country might
remain strong and free. But we can do much more than that if by
our own actions we strive to emulate their deeds of courage.

We know that the peace we enjoy today is a fragile and uneasy
one. The threat of war — and a war more destructive than could
have been imagined by those we honor — hovers over us constantly.
This is a challenge that calls upon us to display as much courage as
was displayed by the men who fought in the wars of the past. It is
a stern reminder to all of us that we must be prepared to make the
same commitments, the same sacrifices, if we expect to preserve the
freedom their lives made possible for us. Let us act, then. And let
us pray that the men of today, and the children of today who will be
the men of tomorrow, will achieve a greater victory in their struggle
with the greatest of all the enemies of mankind — war itself. Let us
humbly petition our Maker that there be no more bloodshed, no more

96