Organic chemol: Hero

Swami Vivekananda Chicago Speech
WELCOME ADDRESS - Chicago, Sept 11, 1893
Sisters and Brothers of America,
It fills my heart with joy unspeakable torise in response to the warm and cordial welcome which you have given us. I thank you in the name of the mostancient order of monks in the world; I thank you in the name of the mother ofreligions, and I thank you in the name of millions and millions of Hindu people of all classes and sects.
My thanks, also, to some of the speakers on this platform who, referring to the delegates from the Orient, have told you that these men from far-off nations may well claim the honor of bearing to different lands the idea of toleration.
I am proud to belong to a religion whichhas taught the world both tolerance and universal acceptance. We believe not only in universal toleration, but we accept all religions as true. I am proud to belong to a nation which has sheltered the persecuted and the refugees of all religions and all nations of the earth. I am proud to tell you thatwe have gathered in our bosom the purest remnant of the Israelites, who came to Southern India and took refugewith us in the very year in which their holy temple was shattered to pieces by Roman tyranny. I am proud to belong to the religion which has sheltered and is still fostering the remnant of the grand Zoroastrian nation. I will quote toyou, brethren, a few lines from a hymn which I remember to have repeated from my earliest boyhood, which is every day repeated by millions of human beings: "As the different streams having their sources in different paths which men take throughdifferent tendencies, various though they appear, crooked or straight, all lead to Thee."
The present convention, which is one ofthe most august assemblies ever held, is in itself a vindication, a declaration tothe world of the wonderful doctrine preached in the Gita: "Whosoever comes to Me, through whatsoever form, I reach him; all men are struggling through paths which in the end lead to me.