My fellow citizens of our great Republic
I wish you a good afternoon, and commence with friendship our start today down a new road for our country and for our people.
Much has been made of the turmoil that has rocked our nation for many years, and much of the pain of those years is still being felt. Whether passive or active in this challenging era the cause of our country continues to press its demand that we as Americans rise to the arena and decide together upon a better fate for ourselves.
Strife and disharmony are thrown into ever sharper relief, the result of passions and perspectives each competing for the future of our people. While dissent and debate are the cornerstones of our liberty, and never shall the flame of our conscience be tilted to light only one portrait of America, as stewards of our freedom we must not knock the flame off its fragile perch. Ever in disagreement is our unity stronger. We cannot let distorted perception be the midwife of hatred. We cannot let our vibrant ardour stifle reason and truth for the sake of self-serving messianic commissions.
We are better than that. Our critics, internal and external, forever miss the strength that lies dormant for our people to ascend to the great tasks laid before us. Our forebears had clear identities for adversaries of worldwide freedom and peace. Now that clarity appears weaker, the enemies of harmony condensed no longer by dogma and personality but by constructed foes and contemplated paranoias. Let us not be held by the perils of the imagined, and instead be fortified by the problems of the present.
Americans cannot hate. Americans must not hate. Our nation is young but experienced. So much detail and colour weaves into our narrative, defining us yet also allowing us to further define ourselves. The basic essence of America is change and growth, as laid by our founding catechism, to enhance our experiences of life and to enrich our expressions of love for each other. Hatred and division have no place in such noble, attainable designs, and it is upon our strength of character that our course for serenity lies.
I will endeavour to reflect that shining quality we have for greatness and for sublime achievement. One of the many geniuses of our nation is that today I am assuming the role of your Commander-in-Chief, and at the same time pledging myself the first servant of the Republic. Our nation was borne by a ministry of all talents and it is with the ingenuity, creativity and dedication from every corner of our land that takes us further up the pantheon of peoples.
I am a realist, yet the idea I invest the most hope in is also the reality: that we are one of the most dynamic societies on earth, that we have brought such unblemished achievements of culture, justice and artistry to the world and that we continue to be the standard by which freedom and expressions of freedom are measured. The idea and the reality are one, and they fill me with hope, as they should fill every one of us.
What should serve as the ultimate psychic and emotional balm is the fact that we can, and will, overcome are present strife and wanderings of uncertainty. As your first servant I will do my best to provide a measure of clarity of vision to forge our way out of the mists of indecision and unconsciousness, back into the ripe fields of brotherhood and sisterhood, illuminating with light the endless palette of lives that are sewn into the tapestry of our national tale.
By joining me on this day, and for I to join you, we are reminded that only together as a family can we settle the discord in our own house and bring up the mutual love that cares, nourishes and inspires. In a nation of millions on a land stretching between horizons, a single American holds in their heart the infinite universe of possibility, and may each of us share and cherish our own worlds in the world we all share. On this day you give me your faith, your courage and your energy with which I may balance the forces at work against us so that they may work for us, and our endeavours as a people may be instilled in each of our waking moments, when we may at last savour the labour of our days in the sun together.
Thank you, thank you for all your courage, good luck, and God bless you.
