A Time for Choosing
But freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it on to our children in the bloodstream. The only way they can inherit the freedom we have known is if we fight for it, protect it, defend it and then hand it to them with the well-thought lessons of how they in their lifetime must do the same. And if you and I don't do this, then you and I may well spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it once was like in America when men were free.
– Ronald Reagan
The Veterans
Written for the Gathering of Survivors the Indian Mutiny, Albert Hall, 1907
To-day, across our fathers’ graves,
The astonished years reveal
The remnant of that desperate host
Which cleansed our East with steel.Hail and farewell! We greet you here,
With tears that none will scorn–
O Keepers of the House of old,
Or ever we were born!One service more we dare to ask–
Pray for us, heroes, pray,
That when Fate lays on us our task
We do not shame the Day!
- Rudyard Kipling
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