Peace must make amends for the misery and sadness of yesterday, and it must be a guarantee against the dangers of tomorrow. The association which has been formed for the purpose of war, between the United States and the Allies, and which contains the seed of the permanent institutions of which you have spoken so eloquently, will find from this day forward a clear and profitable employment in the concerted search for equitable decisions and in the mutual support which we need if we are to make our rights prevail. Whatever safeguards we may erect for the future, no one, alas, can assert that we shall forever spare to mankind the horrors of new wars. Five years ago the progress of science and the state of civilization might have permitted the hope that no Government, however autocratic, would have succeeded in hurling armed nations upon Belgium and Serbia. Without lending ourselves to the illusion that posterity will be forevermore safe from these collective follies, we must introduce into the peace we are going to build all the conditions of justice and all the safeguards of civilization that we can embody in it. To such a vast and magnificent task, Mr. President, you have chosen to come and apply yourself in concert with France. France offers you her thanks. She knows the friendship of America. She knows your rectitude and elevation of spirit. It is in the fullest confidence that she is ready to work with you. President Wilson replied:-- _Mr. President_: I am deeply indebted to you for your gracious greeting. It is very delightful to find myself in France and to feel the quick contact of sympathy and unaffected friendship between the representatives of the United States and the representatives of France. You have been very generous in what you were pleased to say about myself, but I feel that what I have said and what I have tried to do has been said and done only in an attempt to speak the thought of the people of the United States truly, and to carry that thought out in action. From the first, the thought of the people of the United States turned toward something more than the mere winning of this war. It turned to the establishment of eternal principles of right and justice. It realized that merely to win the war was not enough; that it must be won in such a way and the question raised by it settled in such a way as to insure the future peace of the world and lay the foundations for the freedom and happiness of its many peoples and nations.