This brings me up to my second little topic, which is courage. I forget the author, but one many years ago, you know, uttered that famous saying, “The coward dies a thousand deaths, but the brave man dies but once.” In other words, you can live happily if you have courage, because you are not fearing something that you can’t help.

You must have courage to look at all about you with honest eyes—above all, yourself. And we go back to our standards. Have you actually measured up If you have, it is that courage to look at yourself and say, well, I failed miserably there, I hurt someone’s feelings needlessly, I lost my temper—which you must never do except deliberately. You did not measure up to your own standards...

Look at your country. Here is a country of which we are proud, as you are proud of Dartmouth and all about you, and the families to which you belong. But this country is a long way from perfection—a long way. We have the disgrace of racial discrimination, or we have prejudice against people because of their religion. We have crime on the docks. We have not had the courage to uproot these things, although we know they are wrong. And with our standards, the standards given us at places like Dartmouth, we know they are wrong.

Now, that courage is not going to be satisfied—your sense of satisfaction is not going to be satisfied, if you haven’t the courage to look at these things and do your best to help correct them, because that is the contribution you shall make to this beloved country in your time. Each of us, as he passes along, should strive to add something.

It is not enough merely to say I love America, and to salute the flag and take off your hat as it goes by, and to help sing the Star Spangled Banner. Wonderful! We love to do them, and our hearts swell with pride, because those who went before you worked to give to us today, standing here, this pride.

And this is a pride in an institution that we think has brought great happiness, and we know has brought great contentment and freedom of soul to many people. But it is not yet done. You must add to it.

Don’t join the book burners. Don’t think you are going to con ceal faults by concealing evidence that they ever existed. Don’t be afraid to go in your library and read every book, as long as that document does not offend our own ideas of decency. That should be the only censorship.

How will we defeat communism unless we know what it is, and what it teaches, and why does it have such an appeal for men, why are so many people sweating allegiance to it