During the last campaign I was at Beverly alone a good part of the summer, but when Mr. Taft did join me for short intervals he brought Republican Headquarters with him, more or less, and a few political supporters were sure to follow for consultation with him.
There was one good old enthusiastic friend who had always supported him and who was then making a valiant fight in his behalf. And he had faith that they would win. He assured me they would win. He told me how they were going to do it, pointing out where Mr. Taft’s strength lay and telling me how kindly the people really felt toward him.
“Mrs. Taft, you mark my word,” said he, “the President will be re-elected in November!”
“Well,” said I, “you may be right, but just the same I intend to pack everything up when I leave Beverly, and I shall take the linen and silver home.”
At a dinner given by the Lotos Club in New York, just ten days after Mr. Wilson’s election in 1912, Mr. Taft said:
“The legend of the lotos eaters was that if they partook of the fruit of the lotos tree they forgot what had happened in their country and were left in a state of philosophic calm in which they had no desire to return to it.
“I do not know what was in the mind of your distinguished invitation committee when I was asked to attend this banquet. They came to me before election. At first I hesitated to accept lest when the dinner came I should be shorn of interest as a guest and be changed from an active and virile participant in the day’s doings of the Nation to merely a dissolving view. I knew that generally on an occasion of this sort the motive of the diners was to have a guest whose society should bring them more closely into contact with the great present and the future and not be merely a reminder of what has been. But, after further consideration, I saw in the name of your club the possibility that you were not merely cold, selfish seekers after pleasures of your own, and that perhaps you were organised to furnish consolation to those who mourn, oblivion to those who would forget, an opportunity for a swan song to those about to disappear....
“The Presidency is a great office to hold. It is a great honour and it is surrounded with much that makes it full of pleasure and enjoyment for the occupant, in spite of its heavy responsibilities and the shining mark that it presents for misrepresentation and false attack.... Of course the great and really the only lasting satisfaction that one can have in the administration of the great office of President is the thought that one has done something permanently useful to his fellow countrymen. The mere enjoyment of the tinsel of office is ephemeral, and unless one can fix one’s memory on real progress made through the exercise of presidential power there is little real pleasure in the contemplation of the holding of that or any other office, however great its power or dignity or high its position in the minds of men.
“I beg you to believe that in spite of the very emphatic verdict by which I leave the office, I cherish only the deepest gratitude to the American people for having given me the honour of having held the office, and I sincerely hope in looking back over what has been done that there is enough of progress made to warrant me in the belief that real good has been accomplished, even though I regret that it has not been greater. My chief regret is my failure to secure from the Senate the ratification of the general arbitration treaties with France and Great Britain. I am sure they would have been great steps toward general world peace. What has actually been done I hope has helped the cause of peace, but ratification would have been a concrete and substantial step. I do not despair of ultimate success. We must hope and work on.”