And with the students’ hymn, let us utter in Latin a simpler word, _Laboremus_. To work with dignity, with probity and with cheerfulness, to assault life with earnestness and to meet it as a mission, trying to fulfil the categorical injunction left us by our dead. They command us to obey and to serve, they command us discipline, sacrifice and obedience. We should really be the last of men if we failed to do our clear duty. But we shall not fail. I who hold the pulse of the nation and who carefully count its beats, I who sometimes shudder in the face of the heavy responsibilities which I have assumed, feel in me a hope, nay a vibration, of a supreme certainty which is this: that, by the will of the leaders, by the determination of the people, and by the sacrifice of past, present and future generations, Imperial Italy, the Italy of our dreams, will be for us the reality of to-morrow. (Loud applause.) ITALY’S FOREIGN POLICY REGARDING GERMAN REPARATIONS, HUNGARY, BULGARIA, AUSTRIA, YUGOSLAVIA, TURKEY, RUSSIA, POLAND AND OTHER COUNTRIES Speech delivered at the Senate on 8th June 1923. Honourable Senators,—The speech that I have the honour of delivering before your illustrious Assembly may appear analytical, because in it I propose to touch on several questions and to speak decisively upon several problems, especially with regard to internal policy.[13] By this I do not delude myself to be able to convince those who are my opponents in _malâ fide_, nor to disperse completely the small opposition which nourishes itself on detail, and is the effect of personal temperament. Footnote 13: The speech on Internal Policy here referred to will follow this one on page 306. You will not be surprised if I begin with foreign policy, even if it happens that this is the field in which serious and founded opposition does not exist, and it may be legitimately said that our policy is endorsed unanimously by the nation. As I have already said on other occasions, the foreign policy of the present Government is inspired by the necessity for a progressive revaluation of our diplomatic and political position in Europe and in the world. It is a fact that, except for territorial acquisitions bounded by the Brenner and the Nevoso, frontiers wrested by long and bloody wars, Italy was excluded in the Peace of Versailles and other successive treaties from all other benefits of an economic and colonial nature. Solemn pacts signed during the war have lapsed and have not been replaced. The position of inferiority assigned to Italy has weighed and still weighs heavily on the economic life of our people. It is useless to dwell upon recriminations of the past. We must rather seek to regain the ground and time lost. There is no doubt that from October to to-day the situation has notably improved.