INDIANAPOLIS, Jan. 8.--Half playfully, half earnestly, President Wilson told three thousand people at Richmond, Ind., this afternoon that this nation is heeding what is “none of your business”--Europe’s affairs. In place of this, he counseled serious deliberation on America’s business, its future and its part in the betterment of mankind. The nation, he said, must maintain its equilibrium; it must face, too, the problem of the future now that the administration has endeavored to break the shackles on American business.
“You know I have been confined for a couple of years at hard labor and am out on parole for a day or two, but I want to say this, my fellow citizens, that it is very genuine pleasure to me to get abroad again and stir among the people I so dearly love.
“Because the one thing we have to think about down in Washington is the best thing to do for you and the thing that you want us to do for you, and that is a mighty hard thing to find out, particularly when you are not thinking about your own affairs and are constantly thinking about what is none of your business, namely, what is going on on the other side of the water. I say that in playfulness, but I mean it half in earnest.
“It does not do, my friends, to divert our attention from the affairs of this great country.
“The duty which this country has to perform to the rest of the world largely depends upon the way in which it performs its duty to itself.
“I have always thought with regard to individuals that if a man was true to himself, he would then be true to other persons; and I believe that that applies to a great country like ours, that a nation that is habitually true to its own exalted principles of action will know how to serve the rest of mankind when the opportunity offers. That is a very deep philosophy of life which it is very thoroughly worth while living up to.
“We have been trying at Washington to remove some of the shackles that have been put upon American business; but after you have removed the shackles you must determine what you are going to do with your liberty. And there are many tasks to perform for mankind. There are many things to be bettered in this world which we must set ourselves to make better. So what I want to say to you now is merely this: