If we are true to Canada, if we do not desire to become part and parcel of these people, we cannot overlook this the greatest revolution of our times… - Thomas D'Arcy McGee

This is a new land - a land of pretension because it is new; because classes and systems have not had that time to grow here naturally. We have no aristocracy but of virtue and talent, which is the only true aristocracy, and is the old and true meaning of the term. (Hear, hear.)

I will take leave to read to the house a few figures which show the amazing, the unprecedented growth which has not perhaps a parallel in the annals of the past, of the military power of our neighbours within the past three or four years... From January 1861 to January 1863 the army of 10,000 was increased to 800,000... In January 1861 the ships of war belonging to the United States were 83; in December 1864 they numbered 671...
These are frightful figures for the capacity of destruction they represent, for the heaps of carnage that they represent, for the quantity of human blood spilt that they represent, for the lust of conquest that they represent, for the evil passions that they represent, and for the the arrest of onward progress that they represent.

That is a glorious doctrine to instill into society. (Cheers.)