Mr. Carnegie shook his head emphatically.
"That is the old, old argument cropping up again," said he, "the argument that a provocative is a preventive. For us to maintain a great army for the purpose of preventing war thereby would be as sensible as for each of us to be afraid to walk about except with a lightning rod down his back, since men have been struck by lightning. No nation wants to fight us. We have friends throughout the world.
"Millions now resident in military nations are hoping that some day they may be able to become citizens of our beloved republic, principally because it now is not, nor is it every likely to be, military. Humanity loves peace. Here peace abides, and, if we follow reason, will remain unbroken.
"Note the advantages of our own position. Imagine what the task would be of landing seventy thousand hostile soldiers on our shores! First they would need to cross three thousand miles of the Atlantic or five thousand miles of the Pacific.
"And what if they should come? My plan of operation would be to bid them welcome as our visitors, considering them as men, not soldiers; to take them to our great interior, say, as far west as Chicago, and there to say to them:
"'Here we shall leave you. Make yourselves at home, if that thought pleases you; fight us if it does not. If you think you can conquer us, try it.'
"They would make themselves at home and, learning the advantages of staying with us, would become applicants for our citizenship, rather than our opponents in warfare.
"And if they tried to fight us, what would happen to them? Our nation is unique in an important respect. Its individuals are the best armed in the world. Not only, for example, are its farmers armed, but they can shoot, which is far more than can be said of those of Britain or of any other nation.
"The Governments of Europe cannot afford to give their citizenry arms, and, as for the European citizenry, it not only cannot afford to purchase arms, but cannot afford even to pay the license fees which Government demands of those possessing arms with the right to use them.
"But ours? Most Americans can afford to and do own guns with which to shoot, and, furthermore, most Americans, when they shoot, can hit the things at which they shoot.