It is impossible for any man to know just how well he himself does such a difficult task--how accurately he is coming to understand the sources and character of a people's actions.

Yet, at the worst, I do know something about the British: I know enough to make very sure of the soundness of my conclusion that they are necessary to us and we to them.

Else God would have permitted the world to be peopled in some other way.

And when we see that the world will be saved by such an artificial combination as England and Russia and France and Japan and Serbia, it calls for no great wisdom to see the natural way whereby it must be saved in the future.
For this reason every day that I have lived here it has been my conscious aim to do what I could to bring about a condition that shall make sure of this--that, whenever we may have need of the British fleet to protect our shores or to prevent an aggressive war anywhere, it shall he ours by a natural impulse and necessity--even without the asking.
I have found out that the first step toward that end is courtesy; that the second step is courtesy, and the third step--such a fine and high courtesy (which includes courage) as the President showed in the Panama tolls controversy.

We have--we and the British--common aims and character.