After all, the Romans were really right; if you want peace you must show yourself prepared for war. Those who are not prepared for war do not have peace, and are defeated into the bargain. So we say to all our enemies: “It is not enough for you to go planting the tricolour all over the place. We wish to see you put to the proof. You will have for a little while to undergo a sort of spiritual and political quarantine. Your leaders, who might again infect us, must be sent where they can do no harm.” Only by thus avoiding the lure of the mistaken idea of quantity shall we succeed in saving the quality and the spirit of our movement, which is no ephemeral one, since it has already lasted four years, equal in this tempestuous century to forty. Our movement is still in its prehistoric period and in process of formation; its real history begins to-morrow. All that Fascismo has accomplished thus far has been negative. Now it must begin to reconstruct. In this way its force, its spirit and its nobility will appear.
Friends, I am sure that the Fascisti officers will do their duty. I am sure, too, that the men will do theirs. Before proceeding to the great task we must make an inexorable selection from the rank and file. We cannot carry useless impedimenta; we are an army of _velites_, with a rearguard of solid territorials. We do not wish to have untrustworthy elements amongst us.
I salute Udine, this dear old Udine to which I am bound by so many memories. Many generations of Italians who were the flower of our race have passed by its broad ways. Many of its young men now sleep their last sleep in the little isolated cemeteries of the Alps or beside the Isonzo, now once again the sacred river of Italy.
Men of Udine! Fascisti! Italians! Take upon yourselves the spirit of these our unforgettable dead and make of it the burning emblem of our immortal country! (Loud applause.)
“THE PIAVE AND VITTORIO VENETO MARK THE BEGINNING OF NEW ITALY”
Speech delivered at Cremona, 25th September 1922.
Before forty thousand _contadini_ set free from the Social-Clerical yoke, who march past in military order in closely-following battalions, the leader’s eloquence is roused and elated, so that one seems to hear the very sound of joy bells ringing in his speech.