The Growth of Cities by Henry Philip Tappan
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Title:The growth of cities:

Author:Tappan, Henry Philip, 1805-1881.

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Print Source:The growth of cities: Tappan, Henry Philip, 1805-1881.

50 p. 23 cm.

New York,

R. Craighead, printer,

1855.

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GROWTH QF CITIES: A 6’ DISCOURSE DEIVERED BEFORE THE NEW YORK GEOGRAPHICAL

SOCIETY, ON THE EVENING OF MARCH 15TH, 1855. BY t. 1. I HENRY P. TAPPAN, D.D., LL.D. CUANCELLOR OF TE UNIVEITY OF MICIGAN. NEW YORK: R. CRAIGHEAD, PRINTER, 53 VESEY STREET. 1855. THE I v A I-1 -. I *i 8 0

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I An Abstract from the Minutes of the American Geographical and Statistical Society. Meeting on Thursday evening, March 15th, 1855.

………… “The Society adjourned to the small Chapel, where Chancellor Tr-.’ Tappan, of the Michigan University, read a paper on the Growtht of Cities, etc. “After Mr. Tappan had finished his lecture, several gentlemen expressed their approbation of the principles developed in so masterly a manner, and suggested the expediency of publishing this paper for the benefit of a larger circle of our fellow-citizens. On motion of the Hon.

Alexander W. Bradford, the thanks of the Society were voted to Mr. Tappan, and Charles King, LLD., was authorized to make the necessary arrangements for printing said paper as a Pamphlet.” ARCHIBALD RUSSELL, Recording Secretary. ir -k 1H E A I 0 I :-I ISq

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ft_ _atI THE GROWTH OF CITIES. CITIES had their origin in the necessity of a common defence. Hence the first cities were fortresses; and where the face of the country admitted of it, were built on hills or amid rocky fastnesses. Petra was built amid impregnable rocks. Rome was built on seven hills. The old cities of Etruscan origin are scattered on a chain of hills; there the inhabitants are still congregated, while the pastures, the fields of corn, and the vines fill the plains below. Where the country presented only a continuous plain, and there were no hills and rocks to be found, cities were located on the banks of large rivers, whose waters were diverted into moats around the walls. Babylon stood on the banks of the Euphrates, Nineveh on the banks of the Tigris, and Paris on an island in the Seine. The place of strength next became the seat of empire,the residence of kings,-and collected-& about it regal dignity and magnificence. So Petra became a gem of beauty among the rocks,-the glory of Arabia; Babylon and Nineveh the vast palaces of kings; and Rome, upon the seven hills’, the Capital and Mistress of the world. Sometimes, like Alexandria, St. Petersburgh, Berlin, and Washington, cities have been founded as Capitals. But other necessities arose-the necessities of Commerce; and Commerce sought for itself the centres of trade, and facilities of transportation. Thus Tyre, and Sidon, and Carthage, and Athens sprang up on the Mediterranean; Venice upon islands in the Adriatic; Byzantium on the Bosporus; London on the Thames; and Palmyra on the grand route by which Caravans passed from the rising to the setting sun. In the feudal times, when the Barons built upon the hills, I I’ I I

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Y or perched upon pinnacled rocks, not cities, but their solitary towers, to overawe the weak, and to plunder industry, then enterprising men congregated in cities in the midst of fertile districts to profit the world, while they enriched themselves, by the manufacture of useful fabrics. Their main employment lay amid the arts of industry, while at the same time they were, by compulsion, soldiers. One hand rested upon the loom or the anvil, while the other wielded sword and spear. With them it was not work and play, but work and battle. And thus arose the free cities of Germany and the low countries. The cultivation of literature and science, and the diffusion of knowledge have, by their necessities, also, caused cities to spring up. The cultivation of literature and science requires a concentration of means and efforts. Learned men and libraries cannot be carried to the door of every individual. Learned men require to be associated that they may act upon each other for their common advancement in knowledge and culture, and that they may unite their labors for scientific discovery, for literary production, and for the education of youth. Books scattered here and there are like a scattered capital; when collected in a large library, they are like a concentrated capital.

Thus great Universities come into being, and a nation becomes supplied with scientific men and authors. Universities have generally been located in cities already existing, but they have collected cities around them whenever they have been planted in the solitude. Thus a ford for oxen over the Isis, and a bridge over the sluggish Cam, near which great Universities grew up, have lost their importance, while they have given their names to the large, populous, and beautiful cities of Oxford and Cambridge. Religion as well as learning has given birth to cities; Jerusalem, Delphi, and Heliopolis, the sacred seats of old religions, gained their wealth and splendor from this source. Such, in brief, are the causes and occasions which have given rise to cities. But their history shows us that they have seldem preserved their simple original character; and we shall see, in the progress of this discussion, that their fiull development requires more elements than the one immediate 4

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5 ly connected with their origin. It is true, indeed, that one element naturally grows out of another and yet, there are influences which are hostile to this natural development, or which, at least, may give a disastrous predominance to some over others. In the growth of cities the fortress became a royal resi dence. But, where the courtwas, there would be splendor, elegance, and refinement carried out, to the utmost idea of civilization which had as yet obtained. Hence, naturally, the royal city, where the monarch seized this idea, and felt its genial impulse, became the seat of learning and the arts. The ruins of Babylon are shapeless mounds, but history has not left us without records of its palaces and hanging ‘ gardens, its treasures, its beautiful arts, and the learning of its Magi. Nineveh, in our times, has been exhumed, and reveals to the astonished eye the indisputable remains of royal magni ficence, and of a sculpture which, belonging to the same type with the Egyptian, may claim to vie with it as representing that stage of the art, when boldness of design and elaborate finish formed the chief characteristics; and Grecian elegance and grace had not yet appeared. The massive ruins of Egypt still remain. The Pyramids, the Tombs, the exiled obelisks, the mutilated Sphynx, Thebes and Karnak, attest the power, the splendor, the art, the gorgeous forms of life of those ancient dynasties. The ancient fortress of Romulus and Remus, afterwards the imperial city of the Csesars, in its Coliseum, its triumphal arches, its ruined palaces and temples, and the exhumed treasures of art which crowd the Vatican, calls up a vision of imperial greatness, power, and nagnificence, and of the development of the arts, which the imagination might ambitiously claim as its own, did not the stupendous and beautiful ruins furnish data which make the vision only a just historical conception. The little island, La Cit6, in the Seine, first selected as a secure position, is now only the centre of the vast capital of the Bourbons and the Napoleons, where the brilliancy and gaiety of the Court, and the displays of the great mart of fashion, are eclipsed by the sub itantial glory of art and learning. - Of the capitals which have been founded, perhaps none Ai

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6 has retained the original character more exclusively than St.

Petersburgh, which may still be said to be divided between the court and the army. On the other hand, Alexandria, which at first supplanted Tyre as the mistress of commerce, became also a famous seat of learning; Berlin stands now unrivalled for its institutions of learning and the arts; and Washington is receiving a new character from the presence of the Smithsonian Institution. The sacerdotal cities have always been the seats of learning and the arts. The merit of being learned men cannot be denied to the priesthood; and the temples of the deities, with their adornments, have always claimed the highest efforts of the arts. The temple of Zion, and the wisdom and magnificence of Solomon, made the Hioly City the glory of the East. Delphi, called by the Greeks the “Navel of the Earth,”’

incalculably enriched by offerings made at the shrine of the oracle, and with its temples, and statues, its gay religious rites, and all its advantages,“of situation and natural beauty, became the embodiment of a dream of luxury and elegance. Heliopolis, the city of the sun, now known as Balbec, in its still perfect and marvellous columns, and the broken masses which strew the ground, reads to us a history of architectural beauty, and of cultivated life, which makes the traveller wonder at the surrounding desert. And Rome, for centuries a sacerdotal city, with its glorious temple of St. Peter, with its three hundred churches, and its palaces filled with frescoes, statues, and paintings, attests the power of the religious element in the growth of cities. But whatever be the other elements of growth, there are two which must always be present more or less, and these are manufactures and commerce. They, of course, must always exist to a sufficient extent to bring in, or to create, and to distribute whatever is necessary to meet the wants of the inhabitants. But they do not exist to a sufficient extent if they do not afford full employment to the laboring classes. The offerings at the shrines, as in Delphi, the plunder of provinces, as in ancient Rome, and the visits of Pilgrims, as in, Rome of the Middle Ages, may supplant the necessity of industry; but this always inevitably leads to a luxurious and besotted or to a seditious populace. Whatever be the predominant character of the city, it cannot be a city of a health 0

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7 ful character and of enduring prosperity, without flourishing manufactures and commerce. One of these two may, indeed, predominate over the other, while they necessarily beget each other; and so we have strictly commercial cities, and others strictly manufacturing. The principle is, that, to be virtuous, men must have work; and commerce and manufactures, comprising of course the mechanic arts, are the natural forms of industry in cities. The development of commercial cities into higher forms of life, is a remarkable fact in their history. The wealth of Athens, unquestionably, arose from its commerce; and yet, when we think of Athenian life, its commerce seldom comes into view; but our minds are filled with the glories of the Acropolis; with the philosophic musings of the grove of Academus, and the names of Socrates and Plato; with the eloquence of Pericles and Demosthenes; with the heroism of Miltiades and Themistocles; with the theatre, where the tragedies of Aschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, were represented; and with the character of that wonderful people who, from morn to eve, could listen to matchless oratory and poetry, and judge with critical skill of the proprieties of sentiment and language. Thus, too, Byzantiurn upon the Bosporus grew into Constantinople, the magnificent capital of the Eastern Empire, filled with men of learning, and all the adornments of the arts; Venice upon the Adriatic, at one time the great commercial emporium of the world, became a city of palaces, where mechant-princes were the patrons of scholars and artists; 2orence, upon the banks of the Arno, became the home of the Muses, and is still, when its other titles of honor have departed, one great Museum of painting and sculpture, where deities “breathe in stone,’

or look out with eyes of life from the canvas; Genoa, upon the Mediterranean, grew another Venice, if Venice were not only another Genoa; Antwerp, upon the Scheldt-the home of Rubens -mingled with its commercial records a history of genius; the beautiful Naples, upon that wizard bay, whose summer gales breathe from ancient shores, has become the treasurehouse of ancient and modern art; and Holland, the most intensely industrial and commercial of all the countries of the Earth, has filled her cities with institutions of learning, and

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8 works and monuments of art. Other cities of more modern date might be mentioned, where the same tendencies are observable: but the most noted instances will suffice. It must be confessed, that manufacturing cities have not exhibited the same tendencies to the same degree; of which Liege, Malines, Lyons, Birmingham, and Manchester, may be cited as instances.

Still manufacturing cities have not been destitute of art and refinement, and undoubtedly possess capabilities of reaching both. The free towns of the middle ages possessed a mixed manufacturing and commercial character, and a mixed industrial and heroic character; and hence we find in them a higher tone of life than in the purely manufacturing towns of modern times. The causes of the superiority of the commercial over the manufacturing cities, may be found in the more extensive acquaintance which they form with other nations, in respect to their peculiar productions, their advantages, physical and intellectual, their modes of life, their languages, literature, and arts. Commercial cities are to manufacturing cities, in these respects, what cities in general are to the rural districts. Hence we find commercial cities naturally taking the lead in the introduction of various improvements from abroad, and even coming to wear a foreign aspect. A stranger, unacquainted with the history of Venice, would say, at once, that this people had held communication with the East; their habits and the style of their architecture are so oriental. The influence of this wide-spread intercourse is various: it enlarges the boundaries of knowledge; it mwlds and humanizes through spontaneous and insensible imitation; it weakens narrow prejudices by revealing objects worthy of admiration in other nations; and it stimulates to activity through natural pride and national competition. In both commercial and manufacturing cities there is a strong tendency to free institutions. This arises from the very nature of trade and manufactures, which require freedom of thought, enterprise, inventions, and action.

Nothing can be more fatal to them than arbitrary restrictions. They have their own inherent laws by which they demand to be governed. Hence the greatest commercial states have ever been free states. Carthage, Greece, Venice,

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9 and Holland, are examples. And where, like ancient Tyre or modern England, the form of government is monarchical, it is not despotic; for the spirit of enterprise and resolute activity, demanded by commerce, must ever be inconsistent with a despotism. Of manufacturing states, the free towns which prostrated the power of the Barons, are examples. The causes, however, which go to give the ascendency in intelligence and refinement to commercial cities, make them also more remarkable for the development of free institutions. A servile condition of the masses of the people is more consistent with manufactures than with commerce; for the laborer is more liable to be oppressed and degraded. But while we see so many causes at work to give cultivation and elevation to commercial cities, and while so many illustrious instances can be adduced where these have been attained, there are other causes at work also of an opposite character, nor are instances wanting to illustrate their power. In a commercial city or state, there is one idea and purpose which is prone to absorb every other, and to become the governing one; and that is, obviously, the idea and purpose of accumulating wealth. Refinement, elegance, art, and literature, may follow the accumulation of wealth, and have followed it, as we have seen, in many commercial states, and would seemn naturally to follow it; and yet the passion for accumulation may become so engrossing as to leave no taste or leisure for higher pursuits. Or if a diversion be made, it may be a diversion in the direction of luxury and splendid parade, rather than in the direction of learning and the fine arts. And if it is admitted that eventually a commercial city or state must reach a high intellectual and social refinement, then we have to contemplate the possibility of a lone series of years wasted upon forms of life unproductive ol any permanent results, and leaving behind no lofty histories, no works of literature, and no beautiful memorials of art. Tyre and Carthage are, perhaps, the two most striking instances of commercial prosperity which belong to ancient times; and yet they seem never to have advanced beyond luxury and splendor, nor have they left to mankind one work of literature, or one precious remain of art. They aeased to exist, although their existence was by no means

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10 brief, before they had advanced to a higher life; and now they are the mere names of departed nations. What a striking contrast is presented in the city of Athens I Never so wealthy or mighty as Tyre or Carthage, but leaving behind in its history, its philosophy, its oratory, its poetry, and in its glorious remains of art, a treasure which mankind will always preserve, elements of civilization which permeate the noblest forms of modern national existence. Tyre is a place where the fisherman spreads his net, and Carthage is a desolate plain; while Athens is still the resort of pilgrims, who sit among the ruins of the Parthenon, and there read again the “winged words” of the greatest masters of human language, and gaze with tearful eyes upon forms of beauty, which neither the hand of time nor the barbarism of man has been able wholly to deface. And the ancient Etruria, although overrun and crushed by the Romans, no less than Carthage, and with scarcely a remnant of its language existing, and that well nigh unintelligible, still from its deep and silent tombs presents us undecayed forms of beauty, which exhibit a perfection of art not unworthy the chisel of the Grecian Phidias. The history of Carthage is, in several respects, a warning to commercial states and cities. Its situation on the Gulf of Tunis gave it both an extensive maritime and land trade; and it grew, in consequence, to vast wealth and power. Sardinia, Sicily, and Spain, were among its conquests; and at one time it seemed to threaten the very existence of Rome itself. Its exterior harbor was filled with merchant ships, while its interior harbor, strongly fortified, and entered by a magnificent portico, was crowded by hundreds of war galleys. Within its walls was collected a population which, in its highest prosperity, probably amounted to a million of souls-a population alive to all the interests of a prosperous commerce, and glorying in their riches. Without the walls a fertile and beautiful country was studded with the villas of the merchants. The silver mines of Spain and Sardinia were then unexhausted-money abounded, and the precious products of all nations. From generation to generation the governing principle of the Carthaginian was to make money. And Carthage was dear to him, because there he could make money. He had battles to fight, and

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11 conquests to make; but he did not trouble himself to fight his own battles, or to make his own conquests. From the barbarous tribes of the interior he hired hundreds of thousands of mercenaries, and they fought and conquered for him, while he went on to make money. Every Athenian was a soldier: whether poet, philosopher, artist, or merchant, he never forgot he had a country to fight for, and he never would resign the heroic work to mercenary hands. Every Athenian in his nature was an artist, and a man of sentiment; and understood the noble uses of wealth, in adorning the city which he loved, with monuments of art, and ill rewarding the imperishable works of genius. The very air of his country was haunted by the spirits of divinities. Every spot was sacred by the history which consecrated it. His soul was wedded to his country by religion, by poetry, by heroic enthusiasm. The Carthaginian piled up riches, and collected the appliances of luxury, and was content. Even the great commanders-for there were great commanders in Carthage -were nurtured in family factions rather than in patriotic devotion, and were inspired by the lust of rich conquests, rather than by the heroism of defending country and home. And the noblest of them all, drew his fiery energy from the spirit of revenge.

When Carthage entered into that awful death struggle with Rome, her fall was inevitable. The merciless sentence fo Cato, Delenda est Carthago, and its unrelenting execution, can never, indeed, be justified. But when the sentence was uttered, the fate of Carthage was sealed. Rome had not yet imbibed the Athenian spirit of art and refinement; but she was not inferior to Athens in the patriotism and heroic devotion of her citizens.

The battles of Thrasymene and Cannse, were fought on the part of Carthage by Spaniards and Africans; and the Carthaginian merchants at home rejoiced over victories which their hands had not aided. But Rome mourned over these battles as at once the loss of national honor, and the slaughter of her citizens. Hence the renewed gigantic exertions which followed every defeat, The Roman then fought his own battles. When he bled, the blood was drawn from the great national heart. When he conquered, Rome triumphed. He lived but for his coun

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12 try, and in his country. The contest could never be given over while a citizen remained within the walls of the city. To the Roman, Rome was everything. He had nothing to live for when the city of the seven hills was gone. It was this stern and all-absorbing patriotism, which made the Roman an over-match for the Carthaginian. The Carthaginian lived to make money: he traded to make money: and he sent out his mercenary bands to conquer the lands of gold and silver, and gems, and all precious products; and Rome must be crushed when Rome met him in the path of his golden conquests. And yet the war with Rome was rather the affair of Hannibal than of Carthage. The Roman fought only for Rome. Hence Rome was strongest at home: Carthage was strong only abroad. When the war was carried to the gates of the former, she was like the Lioness invaded in her den, sheltering her whelps. When the war was carried to the gates of the latter, she was like the Hare driven to her last cover. The Romans, in an emergency, were concentrated. If there had been factions and divisions before, they were forgotten now. The danger of the city was to them like pressure upon the keystone of an arch. The Carthaginians were the more divided the more their city was threatened. The last days of Carthage is a history of bribery and corruption and rivalry. Even a Roman party sprang up within the walls of the city. The selfishness nurtured by the love of gain ministered no patriotic devotion in the hour of trial. Instead of forming one compact phalanx of devoted heroism, every individual seemed intent only upon his own interest and security. They would defend Carthage as they had enriched it. They had been so wholly accustomed to practise the principles of political economy, that they had lost the ability of practising the principles of duty. It is true, indeed, that when all hope of mercy from the Romans was abandoned, the character of the Carthaginian melted away in the energies common,to human nature when roused by despair.

In the words of’Heeren, “the close of this great tragedy confirms the observation, that Rome trusted to itself and to its sword-Carthage to its gold and its mercenaries. The greatness of Rome was founded upon a rock; that of Carthage upon sand and gold dust.” In the decline and fall of Carthage we have an exemplifi

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13 cation of the danger and ruin to which a commercial city or state is exposed. If gain be allowed to become the all-absorbing, the governing passion, then the fine sentiments and feelings of humanity disappear. Then a taste for art and learning finds no place, or appears only in the meretricious form of luxurious display; then philanthropy, chivalry, and patriotic devotion become dreams of romance before a hard and sarcastic utilitarianism. The decisive characteristic of this total absorption in gain appears where money is only employed to make money, and large accumulations become only the foundations of still larger-where all profit, as the political economists say, is made to take the form of fixed capital, that new and richer profits may arise. Let it be understood that we by no means condemn the principles of political economy. We have already stated that commerce and manufactures are necessary elements in the growth of cities, and that there must be work enough to employ the whole population. We believe in the accumulation of fixed capital in reference to new and richer profits. We believe in the principles of political economy, as we believe in the principles of mechanics. We only say that there are other principles besides, which are no less important and indispensable. There are principles of truth, beauty, and morality also. There are principles of utility, which fill the land with material wealth and comfort. There are principles of faith, duty, and education, which adorn the human soul, and which cause the man to grow up to the full stature of a man; and which show their outward effects ia the healthful condition of the body politic, in social-virtue and refinement, in institutions of religion and learning, in the noble arts of beauty, in those great public works by which one generation makes its impression upon generations to come, and lives as an inspiration in the beating hearts of millions from age to age. Tyre and Carthage are as if they never had been.

That bustling, gorgeous life has departed like “the baseless fabric of a vision,” and save the warning of their example, they have given nothing to the world. But Greece and Rome have given us everything-language, philosophy, poetry, arts, and laws-the whole fabric of civilization. ,1

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14 Various are the uses of money. It is a mighty power for good or for evil. It is a mighty power for good where it is employed in the cause of truth, of knowledge, and virtue. But let its engrossing use be merely to make increase of itself, and then it grows out into every form of evil.

Then, the great type of excellence becomes material thrift; then the commanding influence is material possessions; then the offices of the state, the church, and of society at large, are valued by a material standard, and become a matter of bargain and sale; then the holy rite of matrimony is changed into a commercial arrangemnent where two parties sell themselves and buy each other, and the-solemnities of a funeral are but a mock tragedy to usher in the festival of hungry heirs. One of the most unhappy consequences of the mastery of this element in cities, is that every office of society having its money value strongly expressed, while its inherent worth, honor, and dignity pass out of view, it becomes an object of desire and competition only to a class to whom its pecuniary value makes it available. The man best fitted for the office may be the very man to whom its money value is of no account; and he, in this state of society, may be wholly unwilling to resign his more profitable pursuits, or even to trespass upon them, in any way, in order to discharge a pub. lic trust. On the other hand, the man least fitted may be the one to whom its peculiar money value is an object of prime consideration. The unwillingness or indifference of the first, enables the last to put himself forward as a candidate. The’success of one candidate of this description, will embolden others, until at length a party of the most incompetent, and it may be, of the vilest members of society, become the office seekers and the office holders. There are now two classes into which the community is divided; the men of commerce, who, all absorbed in prosperous business, neglect public affairs; and the men who, without any fixed trade or commercial pursuits, make a trade of office, and fatten upon the public treasury. Here begins the reign of deminagoguism, with bribery, corruption, and sedition in its train. Livingin ceiled houses, riding in gilded coaches, rolling together immeasurable wealth, the men of commerce are for a time unaffected by that public peculation which,

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15 widely distributed among the many, but slightly touches the individual.

When the evil in all its magnitude breaks upon them, it is too late to correct it. The quiet and undistracted pursuit of gain which they purchased by giving up their country to be the prey of demagogues, can be maintained no longer. Plunder has become audacious. While men slept, the very laws have been shaped to afford it opportunities, and magistrates have been selected to wink at its enormities. The leaders strengthen themselves by a division of the spoils. The party who live upon the public treasury have grown so numerous that it can only be supplied by onerous taxes. The great proprietors, the men of wealth, at length, feel the pressure of the burden. Vain efforts are now made at reform. The state which they abandoned, aban dons them Public virtue has died out. There is no patriotism to appeal to. They who would now arouse it, were the first to renounce it as a principle of action. What now remains? Bribery and corruption can only be met by bribery and corruption. The holders of property enter into a fierce struggle with the holders of the treasury.

The low est dregs of society are courted. The state is divided into contending factions. Can any one predict the end? Will reform come by a terrible revolution? Will the devoted state fall a prey to a foreign invader? Is it Carthage that we are describing? Then must the Roman who acts in the energy of devoted patriotism, prove the mightier; and the proud city of commerce must bow to a fate which her own insatiate love of gain has prepared for her. It is evident from the view we have taken, that various elements enter into the proper growth of cities, and that the predominance of one element is the cause of weakness and ruin. Thus far our discussion has been historical and illustra tive. Let us now look at the subject philosophically. There can be no question that the association of men in cities is favorable to the highest development of human ity.

There are two directions in which the Power of civic association shows itself-the direction of labor and capital and the direction of intelligence and cultivation. I. Labor and Capital. What we call division of labor is really combination of labor. It is bringing many men to do

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16 a piece of work, and then distributing the several parts of it among them. It is therefore a combination of effort to one end Where there is labor, there must be capital, for capi tal is the material upon which labor expends itself. the instrument by which it works, and the subsistence upon which it is sustained. There must, therefore, be a com bination of capital wherever there is a combination of labor. Now a city is, in its very nature, a combination of capital and labor, on a large scale, and a corresponding division or distribution of labor. From this, two things must result and form distinguishing characteristics of cities, an energetic enterprise and industry, and a high degree of perfection in all material products embracing all the utilities and comforts of life.

Enterprise and industry in a city are quickened by example, by competition, by the mutual support of different forms of industry, and by inventions and arrangements springing from a multitude of minds acting upon each other. For the same reasons, material products and all useful things must be perfected in cities. Here, public buildings and dwelling-houses, and food and clothing, and every convenience and comfort naturally take their proper forms, and man comes to understand the true economy of life. Hence, it must be confessed, that in cities all great improvements have generally had their origin; and the reason is obvious, why they have so often been the seats of empire, and have always been the arbiters of fashion and taste. The human being dwelling alone, or in sparsely settled districts, without any communication with cities, remains unacquainted with his own capabilities, and the possibilities of iinprovement; and he deteriorates in prejudice and ignorance, and rusts in imbecility. In cities, men are forced into the knowledge of their capabilities; and the possibilities of improvement open to them without a limit. The surrounding country feels, also, the power of the civic life, and finds there the necessary complement of its own life. Agriculture is stimulated by the demands of the market which it always finds in a neighboring city. And in the country immediately adjacent, agriculture will be first improved by the same causes-which improve other arts. In exchange for his products the agriculturist will bring from

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17 the city various commodities for comfort, convenience, and elegance, while by the intercourse induced by this trade, he will advance in intelligence and manners. Thus cities are to be considered as the centres of civilization, as well as of the industrial arts. II. The power of civic association shows itself, again, in the direction of intelligence and cultivation. Cities tend to superior intelligence by the information which they naturally collect from intercourse with various and often distant places, and by the great variety of character, talent, and accomplishments, which they draw together in strangers and travellers, as well as in the native population. Cities are an accumulation of mind, as well as of capital and labor; and, consequently, their intellectual growth seems, in some sort, to b(,determined by a law of political economy, no less than their material growth. Then we are to consider that wonderful influence which human beings exert over each other by daily intercourse.

It is the influence of words, of looks, of manners. Men talking daily with men make a common stock of information and ideas, and keep each other’s minds at work. Thought is not allowed to slumber the tramp on the pavement, the ring at the door, new faces continually presented, constant talk from morning to night-on business, on politics, on the latest news, on a thousand topics trifling or important; constant talk, constant hearing, constant seeing, constant going about-what an excitement there is in this city life! Men are here all pouring out to each other, and quaffing together the sparkling champagne of life. There is often too much excitement-too much talking; hearing, and seeing, and going about, and not enough of still thought; but, nevertheless, here, more than in any other form of life, men are sharpening each other’s wits. The influence of looks and manners is no less striking. How different the look of the savage from that of the civilized man! how different the look of the uncultivated from that of the cultivated man! The savage, peering about in the wilderness, gets that wild, startling stare peculiar to him; the clown, unaccustomed to various society, can scarcely look into the eyes-of men at all, but stands simpering and hesitating with downcast, sluggish, expressionless eyes. In cities, men get accustomed to look 2 I

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18 into each other’s eyes. God meant human eyes to do service in this way.

Looking at each other, they inspire and temper each other, and beget in each other intelligent, kindly, and courteous expressions. Eyes are the very life of human intercourse. Pleasant eyes awaken smiles in human faces, and then pleasant words follow. To meet human beings every day, men and women, boys and girls, and to meet them by hundreds, and to exchange with them pleasant looks, pleasant smiles, and pleasant words, varying with condition, age, and sex, can it be otherwise than that this enlivens, softens, and polishes manners? Is it not a gentle attrition by which human beings are rounded off to each other? Is it not a kindly attraction by which they are drawn into mutual respect and courtesy? The common judgment of mankind has awarded a decision in the very forms of language by borrowing the words politeness and civili~ation from the name of the inhabitants of a city. Where a city is the seat of a court, where men of high education and breeding resort, there are, of course, superior influences, and a nobler and more cultivated style of manners generally appears. An Englishman remarked to me that he thought our country labored under a disadvantage in this respect, and that for want of a court we should for ever lack high and courtly breeding. I replied, that there might be some force in his remarks, but that he ought to bear in mind that the American people were all sovereigns, and that therefore they had naturally a sense of dignity quite peculiar to them; and that wherever this was united to education and intercourse with the world, it might lead to a style of manners no less elevated and polished than what is found in the neighborhood of European courts, and would have the advantage of being more widely diffused. Were the Romans in the days of Augustus more polished than the Athenians in the days of Pericles? And this leads me to another particular in the peculiar advantages enjoyed by cities for intellectual cultivation. They are the proper and favorite seats of learning and the fine arts. Cities may be said to become so, because they contain the wealth required for creating institutions of learning, for making collections in the arts, and for sustaining and rewarding genius.

And this, unquestionably, is one reason; -1

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for no narrow scale of expenditure can suffice to endow great universities, and to raise up schools of art. And that spirit of liberality which belongs to flourishing and enlightened cities must attract both learned men and artists. But there is another reason which operates no less power fully, and that is, that universities and schools of art in a great city possess an ample field in which to form an association of cultivated minds. Men of learning and artists require the fellowship of congenial spirits. They advance in knowledge and art, not merely by solitary thoughts and solitary efforts, but by conversation, by an exhibition of their works to minds capable of judging of them, by mutual and just criticism, and by noble emulation. A man ever contemplating himself in solitude, and removed from the opportunities of comparing himself with other men, whatever be his genius and attainments, is prone to become opinionated, prejudiced, and pedantic. To know ourselves aright, it is necessary to know others also. A man, indeed, finds good company in books, and in paintings and statues. But these are the works of men who have been. And is he, the solitary student, the only one who is striving to renew the glory of the past? Perhaps there are others working as well or better than himself. I Why should he not know them, converse with them, and compare work with work? If ordinary men feel the quickening power of daily converse with society, how much more, methinks, must artists and men of learning and genius feel it? Besides, artists cannot but desire to diffuse widely a taste for art, and men of learning a taste for learning. It is in the very nature of genius to give itself away to humanity. It seeks to create for itself a wide atmosphere in human hearts. It would be the radiant sun of a system. It possesses the godlike attribute of finding its blessedness in diffusing, in all life and thought, its own quickening spirit. Now when art and learning are collected in cities, they find right at hand a broad field of human hearts ready for them. And what is done here is not confined here, but the cities are fountains whence the streams flow out through all the land. Paris has always been the great seat of learning and art, in France. It contains the largest library in the 19

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20 world. It contains one of the most extensive and noblest galleries of art in the world. It contains all possible schools of learning and art, where men of the highest eminence give instruction to twenty thousand students. It contains, also, the Institute composed of all the great scholars of France, associated for the single purpose of promoting scientific discovery and every branch of learning. It is easy to conceive how this congregation of, talent, genius, and learning, exerts its influence upon Paris, upon France, and upon the world. It is easy to conceive how that, thus concentrated, they gain a power which would be lost if they were dispersed abroad. It is easy to conceive, too, how that Paris is the spot, of all others in France, where this mighty accumulation of intellect could be most fitly made. Berlin is the work of Frederick the Great. That truly illustrious monarch, in the midst of war and disaster, never forgot the interests of learning. He laid the foundation of that noble system of public education which has been completed by his enlightened successors. Berlin is, perhaps, the most distinguished seat of learning in the world. Its library, its collections in art, its university, its schools of every description, its great scholars, have made the very air redolent with thought, and its sunlight a symbol of diffusive knowledge.* Munich, the capital of the little kingdom of Bavaria, has grown up under the fostering energy of one nn, and is quite a modern creation. At the close of the last century it was an inconsiderable town of mean appearance. Now it is a large and stately capital, filled with elegant buildings, distinguished for works of art and artists; and the seat of a large university and other schools of learning. Most of this has been accomplished in little more than a quarter of a century. Lewis, the late king of Bavaria, still living, but not occupying the throne, is the author of this marvellous change. Himself no mean poet, and an enthusiast in works of art, he collected around him distinguished men from all quarters. At one time there were in Munich from six to eight hundred artists, either bred and educated * Appendix L

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21 there, or attracted from other countries by the liberal patronage of the king, and the atmosphere of taste and cultivation which he had created. The palace and the glyptothek, or gallery of sculpture, and the buildings connected with them, were erected, and the rich works of art which they contain, collected at his own expense. The rare collection of antique sculpture in the glyptothek was purchased by Lewis while he was yet a young man, and before he came to the throne, for about twenty-five thousand dollars. They are now worth four times that amount, if, indeed, they are capable of being valued in money. The pinacothek, or picture gallery, was opened in 1836. It is a beautiful building. The interior is divided inito nine stately halls, and twenty-three small cabinets adjoining, which together contain twelve hundred and seventy choice pictures, belonging to the different schools of painting. The cabinet of coins contains 20,000 Greek, 18,000 Roman, and about 40,000 other medals.

The museum of natural history is rich and interesting. The royal library is second only to the royal library at Paris, and contains about 500,000
volumes. The university comprises sixty professors and seventeen hundred students. The buildings of the library and university are plain and substantial, with an air of elegance, and admirably arranged. Munich, too, contains many noble monuments. Among these may be mentioned the Hall of Fame, a beautiful edifice, in the Grecian style,and ornamented with appropriate historical and emblematical sculptures. It is designed to contain the busts and statues of the distinguished men of Bavaria. In front, on a pedestal twenty-eight feet high, stands a bronze colossal female statue, emblematical of Bavaria, sixty-two feet high. A bronze lion stands beside her; with one hand she holds a sword, and with the other extends aloft a chaplet. Afar off can that majestic figure be seen, and yet, when you approach near to it, you almost forget the colossal proportions, in its beni nant and life-like beauty. Munich, with no natural advantages of situation, is made beautiful, nevertheless, by gardens and groves, and public walks and drives, as well as by the works of art. It is

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22 altogether an enchanting city. I have been the more particular in my allusions to Munich, because it illustrates how much can be done in a short time, and that, too, bv a single individual, who, with the means, has the taste, liberality, and energy. The old king, retired from public life, is still as busy as ever in adorning the city, and in encouraging art and literature. Hie is now a private gentleman, devoting himself to these elegant pursuits. As long as Munich stands, it will be his monument.

Paris, Berlin, and Munich, remarkable as they are for their intellectual and artistic developments, are remarkable also for their trade and manufactures. The influence of science and taste in the peculiar products of these cities is quite apparent. In all these cities there are institutions for the education of artisans, and science is largely applied to perfect manufactures. London, in point of magnitude, surpasses all other cities. It is the commercial Emporium of the world. It is the greatest commercial Emporium that ever existed. As rapid and vast as the growth of London has been, that growth still continues. Although London, historically, is a very old city, yet the London of to-day is a modern city. Its enormous growth is the growth of our age, and not of centuries.

But the growth of London is, well nigh, purely commercial. It has some noble institutions, such as the British Museum, and it has learned Societies which would do honor to any city; and yet it is not distinguished for institutions of art and learning.* She is a modern Tyre-a modern Carthage; were she also a modern Athens, how glorious she would appear. Such a union would make her the capital of modern civilization. Now she not only falls behind Paris, Berlin, and Munich; she falls behind even Edinburgh. For as London is almost wholly commercial in growth, so Edinburgh may be said to be almost wholly literary, and rises up beneath those dim skies, a Northern Athens. The centre of London is the Bank of England: the centre of Edinburgh is the University. In London, the multitude pouring through the streets, the rush of omnibuses and cabs, the vast assemblage of shops, the steamers upon the Thames, the bridges over the Thames, the very walk, and look, and * Appendix II.

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23 manner of speaking of the people-all give you but Me one idea of anxious, grasping trade; in Edinburgh, life seems substantial indeed, but it is quiet and thoughtful, and you fancy, every now and then, that you can detect a poet or scholar among the people you meet. In London, people rush by each other without mutual recognition; it seems a world of strangers by some fatality brought together. In Edinburgh, old neighbors and friends smile at each other and exchange kind words as they pass along. You wish to get a view of London, and you ascend St. Paul’s-St.

Paul’s itself is crowded to the very entrance by all sorts of shops: it seems like a monarch in his purple robes, and wearing his crown, jostled by a mob-and from the lofty dome what do you see? Nothing but interminable streets, and masses of dingy houses with a smoky heaven above. It is no region of romance, poetry, and beauty; it is the home of Rothchild & Co., of Baring, Brothers & Co. and of ten thousand other companies all driving at the one purpose-the modern home of the Cyclops, where they have taken human names, and put on pantaloons, coat and vest; and laying aside their rude ancient sledge-hammer, have set at work a more complicated, nimble, and perfect machinery, for forging human wealth. You wish to get a view of Edinburgh, and you ascend Arthur’s Seat, and below you lies the Old Town with Holyrood at one end, and the Castle at the other, like a page of Ancient Romance; where the houses are letters,.and the streets are lines, -a black-letter writing curious and startling; and there lies the new Town with Calton Hill rising like an Acropolis above it; and Scott’s monument looking over it, a town of wide, clean streets, with tasteful dwellings, where are the homes of Christopher North and Sir William Hamilton, and many other well known names. Light, airy, and graceful, the New Town contrasts with the Old as the Lady of the Lake contrasts with Spenser’s Fairy Queen. And stretching the eye around, there rise up to view, the Pentland hills, the Braid hills, the hills of Berwickshire, and the Highlands, with the Frith of Forth between;-a wide-spread region of Poetry and Romance, of legend and history. But there are redeeming influences about London. The court and parliament bring together the intellect, the educa

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24 tion and refinement of the Realm. London, too, has in its bosom the noblest parks of any city in the world; and in the neighborhood of these parks are magnificent streets of stately and tasteful dwellings, where the hum of business dies away in the quiet sounds of a more social and cultivated life. Then, too, in the vicinity of London, nay, in consequence of the railroads, one may say in its very suburbs, are found the ancient Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, redolent with’classical associations and withl the memory of illustrious names. Oxford and Cambridge supply to London some measure of the influence which the University of Paris supplies to Paris, the University of Berlin, to Berlin, and the University of Munich, to Munich. And they would supply it in a hundred-fold measure, if, separated from a church establishment, they were thrown open to all with the same freedom and liberality which characterize those other universities, we have named. A university standing in the very heart of a great city, naturally exerts a greater influence over the population, than one standing in the vicinity; and yet, where that vicinity is immediate, and the communication rapid and easy, there is no difficulty in establishing an intercourse which shall identify their interests, and enable the one to permeate the other with its thoughtful vitality and power. And hence, as Oxford and Cambridge come to assume their proper form and character, as popular institutions, we may hope that they will become virtually the Universities of London, as the University of Tiibingen is really the University of Stuttgart, the capital of Wiirtemburg. To advance to another topic-we remark, that cities are peculiarly fitted to the institutions of religion and benevolence. The same causes, indeed, which make cities the centres of intelligence, enterprise, and education, must go to make them, also, the centres of religious and benevolent influence.

The proper comprehension of religious truth requires a cultivated intelligence, while religious and benevolent sympathies are evidently more easily propagated where human hearts are congregated together. Religion, too, requires the force of example, no less than the inculcation of truth: and it is in cities that example can be multiplied and exert its full power. Benevolence, as a part of religion, is

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25 not a mere sympathy, but an active principle. Resolve it into the first, and it exhausts itself in delicious sentiment, and becomes a mere refinement of selfishness. To strengthen and perfect it, you must provide it with objects and occasiqns. It then grows into a fixed habit, and makes its possessor an angel of God “appointed unto them that mourn, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness, to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound.”

Now as it is in cities, where men of all characters and conditions live together, where the changes of fortune are most frequent as well as most apparent, where human passions, coming into the most direct conflict, require most the exercise of mutual forbearance, where the temptations to vice and folly, being most rife, exhibit their unhappy victims most firequentlyso it is here that charity and benevolence find abundantly their objects and occasions. Hence we must here look for religious and benevolent institutions under their most perfect forms, and for the finest developments of the religious and benevolent character. Facts accord with this view. The temples of religious worship have generally been planted in cities. The temple of the sun in Heliopolis, of Isis in Thebes, of Minerva in Athens, of the true God in Jerusalem, of St. Peter in Rome, and the magnificent Gothic Cathedrals of the middle ages, as well as the most magnificent church edifices of modern times in the great cities of Europe,-all show the sentiment of religious worship concentrating itself in cities. The same remarks will apply, with equal truth, to charitable and benevolent institutions; they have generally taken their localities, and found their support in cities. The history of Christianity from the beginning shows how closely its progress has been connected with civic life. The first churches were established in cities, and when it became the prevailing religion, it was in cities that it received its fullest development, and formed its most powerful establishments. Indeed the etymology of the word Pagan, which meant originally a peasant, or the inhabitant of a village, shows this fact. It came to indicate a heathen, because, while the cities embraced Christianity, the inhabitants of the villages or the peasantry I

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26 retained the ancient idolatry. It is true that in our own day this distinction no longer exists; and that the difference between the inhabitants of the country and of the city is not so marked, especially in our own land; but this to a great extent is owing to the more intimate relationship between the two, created by the greater facilities ofcommu-nication. This greater commingling of country and city, is both a cause and indication-of the more general spread of civilization which characterizes the age in which we live. Cities still hold their pre-eminence in religion, education, and arts-they are still the central points of intelligence, enterprise, and refinement; but, performing their mission more perfectly, and spreading abroad their influences more easily and rapidly, they are bringing about a general conformity to a common standard of intellectual, moral, and social elevation. But while these tendencies of civic association towards all that goes to improve the race are thus manifest, it cannot be denied that there are many attendant evils which likewise grow out of it. We have already shown, in alluding to the history of Carthage, what a train of evils, ending in revolution and dissolution, spring from the commercial element where it is allowed to absorb the entire civic life. Cities must always be exposed, too, to the evils of pride and luxury on the part of the-rich; and to the evils of extreme poverty, degradation, and crime, on the part of a very numerous class, arising from the disadvantages of birth and early education, or from the weakness of yielding to temptations which always exist where wealth and population abound, or from-inevitable misfortune. The difference of character and condition are prone to become extreme in cities. Everything has a ranker form and growth. The same principles of association which give such a stimulus to industry, education, and virtue, act also in the region of idleness, ignorance, and crime. The almshouse and prison are here, as well as the manufactory and the schools of learning. As the dispositions to vice may be here more fully matured, so the opportunities of vice are more frequent. The city is the natural field of the demagogue and the exciter of seditions; the securest hiding-place of the thief, the robber, and the homicide.

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27 Two of the worst forms of evil peculiar to city life, are the fictitious grandeur, growing out of a sudden and rapid accumulation of wealth; and the idleness and dissipation attendant upon wealth inherited, unaccompanied by principle, fine tastes, and education. Indeed they are evils very much of a piece, the first belonging to the mature and elderly, the second to the young. The possession of wealth affords the means of culture, but does not constitute it. A fine house and elegant furniture, books, and paintings, collected without judgment or taste, the adoption of unaccustomed etiquette, the use of liveries, the affectation of knowledge and refinement, and fashionable entertainments, make the mere Mrs.

Potiphars of society. The more these are multiplied, the more society really retrogrades. The good homely virtues die out, and nothing remains but pride, pretension, and gaudy shows. With the Mrs. Potiphars, the Mr.

Boosies are naturally linked. A more wretched specimen of humanity cannot be exhibited than a young man who is the mere inheritor of wealth, which a hard-working father amassed for him. The father had but one passion, the love of money. In indulg. ing this passion he neglected to educate his son, or to induct him into business. The son, on his part, aimed simply to make a gentleman of himself by the aid of the tailor, by practising the airs of an exquisite, and forming the habits of a roue, and resorting by turns to the fashionable assemblies, and to the haunts of dissipation.

When the father died, the son had nothing to do but to work out his destiny, courted by mothers, charmed by daughters, and flattered by his hangers-on. The end of his career may easily be imagined. Soon ruined in health and fortune, he may have found an early grave, never to be named or thought of by the giddy crowd from among whom he disappeared like a bubble, among bubbles bursting a little sooner than the rest. Or finding a fit partner, he may have become a sort of reformed rake, and in an elegant establishment, he may still be living on insipid and imbecile, wearing the form, only to shame all the proper attributes, of a human being. A city is the hotbed where such men and women may grow. We may have clowns and boors, and possibly semi-barbarians in the country, but it is in a city alone that we are to look for a c

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28 Mrs. Potiphar and a Mr. Boosy. It is refreshing to look to the rudest forms of life from such a culture as this. Men may grow out of the first in full proportions and strength; the last is an absolute deterioration of the race which nothing can restore. What is the civic life, then, but a scene of conflicting elements-a scene where good and evil appear, as in the whole history, and under all the phases of humanity, “mixed and contending?” But, nevertheless, there is a difference in cities which we cannot mistake; and as we learn the elements which enter into their constitution, so we learn, also, how the different composition of these elements gives birth to all their varieties. And acknowledging that civilization receives its most perfect development under this mode of human existence, it becomes a great and interesting inquiry-what are the elements which enter into the proper constitution of cities, what are the evils to be eliminated, and what are the true principles of growth? An answer in part, at least, to the inquiry may be collected from what we have already said, both in the way of discussion and historical review; but it is still necessary to collect these principles into one succinct view. First.-It is quite evident that cities have their life and sustenance in the industrial arts and in commerce; and that any other mode of subsistence provided for their population must end in deterioration and subversion. Secondly.-It is equally evident that religion and morality are essential elements of the proper civic life. Essential everywhere-the power without which humanity cannot be redeemed and elevated, they are the more essential where human beings are densely congregated, and where, consequently, they require the highest sanctions of social duties, and the most hallowed impulses to observe them. Thirdly.-Assuming the two former to be self-evident, and requiring no further illustration, I wish to call your attention particularly to two other elements which, although introduced, also, in the previous remarks, require, I think, some further notice in reference to our country at large, as well as to ourselves.

These are the sentiment of local attachment, and the higher forms of intellectual and tasteful culture.

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29 As to the first, we have seen its power in the history of Athens and Rome. These cities could never have been what they were without the sentiment of local attachment. All the earthly interests and hopes of the Athenian were concentrated about the Acropolis: all the earthly interests and hopes of the Roman about the seven hills. The murmurs of the Ilyssus were sounds of home to the Athenian. The yellow Tiber turned up a paternal face to the Roman. - To them all the world besides was barbarian and foreign. And they filled their cities with all the adornments of art, and collected there all the appliances of learning, and made them the abodes of great men, and the favorite seats of the Gods. We observe the same fact in regard to all great and celebrated cities. We see it in those cities we have named as distinguished for art and science-in Paris, Berlin, and Munich, and others like them. Love for the city which is our home inspires us with a wish to embellish, enrich, and elevate it with whatever contributes to the finest culture and the purest pleasures of our being.

And then, as we accomplish this, we find the points of attraction continually multiplying, and our home continually becoming dearer to us as it becomes more beautiful and contains more objects to render it worthy of our love. Now, with respect to us, Americans, it cannot be denied that we possess a strong national pride and love. We are thoroughly American. But, surveying as we do, this vast stretch of country as our country, and prone as we are to shift our abode from place to place, from city to city, the truth is, we do not form strong local attachments. We go to some particular place, because we have a special object to accomplish there; we go to stay there for a while, and then we are ready to go anywhere else.

And hence we collect certain benefits in particular localities; and when we go away we carry these away with us; and, perhaps, leave nothing behind as a memorial of our having been there. We all of us have too much of the backwoodsman in our nature, never remaining long enough anywhere to perfect civilization; but always pressing onward to the boundaries of civilization to fell new trees, and to make new beginnings. As this prevents the perfect growth of any one part, so it leaves

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30 the whole immature. Is it our destiny, I often ask myself, to be mere pioneers over this great continent; and must it be left to other generations to found, in beauty and grandeur, the institutions of a high civilization? In other ages, in other nations, the first generations have sunk into oblivion, or live only in uncertain legends. So it was with Greece and Rome. But it was something to preserve the Iliad and the Odyssey, the Cyclopean walls, the Etruscan marbles and vases, and the story of Romulus and Remus. What glorious epics, what massive works, what beautiful remains, what heroic legends have we to give to other times? I know the foundation of our Republic, the heroes of our Revolution, are given in charge to immortality. But even these cannot be given in charge to immortality, without the man of letters and of art-the historian, the poet, the painter, the sculptor. But what are the men of to-day doing for immortality? Ah! it may be we have done something. I bethink me of that sternwarte, as the Germans call it, that watcher of the stars, which the bounty of some of the people of my Western home has erected upon a neighboring hill; whence the Galileo of some future age will still be watching and reading the stars; and then, as often as he descends from his azure seat to tell the world of some new field of light, he will stop and read the names upon its tablet, and recall the age and the men who erected for him those steps towards the heavens. These are the things that make us to be remembered. When I look around upon that rare and beautiful locality -the river, the hills, the plains sloping to the water, the relation of that one point to all around, I hear the voice of the Genius of the place inviting to build and improve and adorn; to plant institutions; to erect temples to Minerva, Apollo, and the Muses; to revive the grove of Academus; to spread the garments of beautiful art over the form of beautiful nature-to make an Athens in the West. And as he gives this invitation, I hear him cheering to the work by promising plenty from the fields, prosperity from the useful arts, and the commerce on the waters, and untold treasures from exhaustless mines. And he tells us to make that spot a beautiful home, and to fill it with all home attractions belonging to the higher and holier part of our be ‘k

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31 ig; and not to leave to another generation to do the work which we can do; but to reap from the ripened fields a harvest of immortality for ourselves. That what we nurture now upon the banks of the Huron is destined to become the alma mater, the fair intellectual mother of many children; modestly retiring from our more public places, that she may hear the songs of the Naiads and the Nymphs, but near enough to infuse her gentle yet kindling influences into that manly strength which is building cities and laboring at all useful improvements; like the queen of love and beauty watching over the son of Anchises, when he built Lavinium in the west as the new home of the Lares which he had transported from the east.

Cities in our country have generally grown up from commerce and manufactures; this was unavoidable. In a new country of such vast material resources, where enterprise pursues its natural direction in perfect freedom, and where wars do not arise to oppose any serious obstacles, material causes must take the lead in the first development. But it is not necessary that those causes should continue to predominate after we have become conscious of a substantial and secure existence. Then the place and the opportunity are opened for intellectual causes to operate. Then public spirit may receive the infusion of higher elements, and impel to intellectual and tasteful culture, and to corresponding works. I have spoken of works that immortalize. You will pardon me for affirming that mere works of utility, although lying at the foundation of national growth, are not the works that immortalize when they exist alone. Commerce and manufactures are changeful and progressive, and the works of one generation are swept away by the works of the next. The improvements of one generation do indeed introduce the higher improvements of the next; but the old and abrogated are ever prone to be forgotten in the new. The New York of to-day is not the New York of fifty years ago; and fifty years hence where will the New York of to-day be? The city has not only advanced in magnitude, it has also been rebuilt. The palaces of the last generation were forsaken and turned into boarding-houses, then pulled down and replaced by warehouses. He who erects his magnificent palace on the Fifth Avenue to-day, has only fitted out a future

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32 boarding-house, and probably occupied the site of a future warehouse.

Were New York now to experience the fate of Athens, or Rome, or Venice, she would leave to the world no memorials whatever. There would be no massive and beautiful remains of architecture to strew the ground, or to stand here and there in pillared and imperishable magnificence; no statues, no frescoes, no epics, and no old and sacred institutions of learning to be resorted to by pilgrims and scholars, when her harbor should no more be crowded by the cornmerce of the world. What would she be but a mere mass of bricks and clay and sunken sewers! And if she goes on increasing and flourishing, must not all the works of the present busy and prosperous generation sink into insignificance, and leave not a trace behind in the more magnificent prosperity of generations that follow?

Shall we not be forgotten, as we have forgotten our fathers? But discoveries in science, and works of literature and art, cannot be thus forgotten; nor can the generation and age and the place be forgotten to which they belong. The age of Pericles, the age of Augustus, the age of Elizal)eth, men will for ever talk about with enthusiasm, for they are immortalized in the works of Phidias, and Virgil, and Shakespeare.

Utilities supplant each other, but works of literature and art cannot supplant each other. Utilities are changeable, but thought and beauty are, like the sun in the heavens, ever shining and never exhausted. Adl the temples which have since been built, do not prevent men from going to look at the ruins of the Parthenon; all the poems which have since been written, do not prevent men from reading the Iliad: all the statues which have since been sculptured, do not eclipse the beauty of the Apollo of the Vatican, or of the Venus of Florence. All the paintings to the end of time, will not lessen by comparison Raphael’s picture of the Transfigurationr in Rome, or his Madonna in Dresden. Utility may not yet have developed the highest comforts; or fancy may change one comfort for another; but the laws of thought and beauty are fixed, and their genuine productions are sealed for immortality. Great errors are committed, therefore, when the growth of a city is directed by mere utilitywhere commerce rules alone, and thought a

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33 and beauty are allowed to take no part, or are degraded into the condition of mere tire-women of luxury and vanity. ite who would contribute to the improvement of his age, instead of seeking an evanescent popularity, should speak out his truthful convictions. We may sing to a people songs of flattery, and hush them into a sweet slumber of self-complacency. Is it not more manly and wiser to unveil to them the majestic countenance of truth, even if it should wear an expression of rebuke? Andacting out this sentiment, are we not constrained to say that the cities of America are, at this moment, with scarcely an exception, elevating utility above thought and beauty? Let us look again at New York, our great commercial Emporium. Possessing an unrivalled situation for commerce, it is no less remarkable for natural beauty. Its two majestic rivers, its bay filled with islands; its opposite shores bold and picturesque; and the great island on which the city stands, itself possessing a variegated surface; altogether here was a combination by which nature invited art no less than commerce. Where the Tombs now stands, there was once a little lake which connected with the Hudson, by an outlet through Canal-street. Near the lake was a hill with a natural and abundant fountain. Had the shores of that lake been terraced and planted with trees, had the hill and fountain been preserved and embellished, had the outlet been left open and spanned with tasteful bridges, how charming that portion of the city would have been I Now there are the Tombs and mean shops and dwellings; the hill with its fountain is sunk to fill up the lake, and the running stream is changed into a covered sewer. How many beautiful elevations have been removed to reduce the city to one unvarying level-so level that the water stagnates in the gutters, at the expense of health, as well as of beauty. Hitherto, no large parks have been made, and we see houses jammed along narrow streets The upper portion of the city may yet be redeemed, but the beauty of the lower is gone for ever. No magic can restore the hills, the fountains, lakes and streams; and the dense mass of buildings can never be removed, for parks with trees and flowers. The heights of Brooklyn, the shores of Hoboken, might have been preserved for enchanting public grounds. They too are lost for ever. Warehouses occupy 3

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34 the one, and mean dwellings are crowding over the other. It is true, indeed, that these were private property, and the owners could not be expected to sacrifice their interests to adorn the city. But then, the city might have purchased these grounds, and made them sacred to nobler and more needed uses. In such a case, commerce might have wisely made a sacrifice. And yet it is demonstrable that no real utility would have been lost. Nature, who had formed the harbor, had given space enough to commerce besides those rare spots which she herself had consecrated to the spirit of beauty. There was required for the management of such a city, men of the highest cultivation and taste. But here was committed the very error which we have already described. New York was filled with men of all nations, and men from every part of the Utnion, who seemed to congregate here only for one purpose-to make money. They had no time to become the fathers of the city. Totally absorbed in the one purpose, they heard not the voice of the Genius of the place; they formed no strong local attachment. The men who might be supposed capable of giving a right direction to the public counsels, kept aloof, and pursued their own prosperous business. I have heard such declare that New York was a commercial city, and could be nothing else. How could they forget Athens, and Venice, and Genoa, and Florence! And what has been the result? A class of men rose up from among the lower strata of the populace, who made it their business to manage the city; they took upon themselves to be the fathers of the city. They imposed taxes, and got into their possession a treasury of enormous riches. They had not the capacity, the taste, or the will to adorn and improve the city: but they plundered it from year to year-they plundered it of more money than Frederick the Great expended upon Berlin; than Lewis of Bavaria expended upon Munich;-they plundered it of money enough to have created a University, galleries of art, and every form of culture; and to have embellished the city with parks and public gardens. It is just now that the holders of property, at last driven to desperation, have entered into a conflict with the holders of the Treasury; and we have witnessed in our times the strange spectacle of bills of indictment and imprisonment

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35 threatened against the city legislators and governors-the city fathers!

We shall have to wait to see the end of the conflict. A temporary victory, a temporary reform, will sharpen the opposite party to a sterner conflict.

It will take years to remedy the evil, if it be remedied at all. One thing is certain, it can never be remedied unless men of intellect, taste, worth, and honesty, enter zealously and devotedly into public affairs; and unless love for the city, and ambition for its intellectual and tasteful development supplant the mere ambition of commercial prosperity. The history of cities proves conclusively that they require for their proper government, as well as growth, the wide infusion of the spirit of intellectual and tasteful culture. Common school education is not sufficient, for this is mainly a business education. Even religion is not enough, for there are multitudes whom religion does not adequately reach.

And if religion could be brought to bear powerfully upon the entire population of a city, its wise, elevating, and benignant spirit would sanction and inspire the cultivation of the nobler parts of human nature.

And what police can govern a city contrary to the will of the populace, where they themselves are created by the votes of the populace? A great city requires in its bosom, or in its proximity, a University where the youth of fortune can employ their time in attaining to high culture, instead of filling hours of idleness with insane and ruinous dissipation: and where all of every condition, who feel disposed, may gain the most perfect forms of education. [*A great city requires in its bosom all the humanizing influences which the presence of works of art and public libraries, and institutions of art and learning, can exert over the population at large. In Paris, where there is a naturally excitable and turbulent populace, it is easy to perceive the influence of a universal refinement in restraining them, arising from these sources. No one can be in Berlin or in Munich without perceiving a general tastefulness, decency, and order among the people, evidently arising from the free access they have to the libraries and galleries of art. The multitudes of a city crave excitement and amusement. Provide them with beautiful public gardens and places of

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culture, and they will generally be content. Leave them without cultivation to provide amusement for themselves, and need we be surprised if intemperance, debauchery, and riot ensue? To give this high tone to cities, men of taste and education must be attracted to them, to infuse a spirit of culture into society: and men of taste and education in a city, should combine their efforts to this end. Men of wealth, too, as well as men of education, should be deeply alive to this object. Native good sense can judge of its importance even where the opportunities of high education have not been enjoyed. Besides, if it were estimated only in its pecuniary bearings, it would claim the attention of every political economist. The example of New York is sufficient to prove this. The scenes we have witnessed here would never have existed, had the innocent and elevating amusements of taste and culture been plentifully provided, and an aesthetic sense, or sense of the beautiful, been made to pervade the populace. Our attention is frequently called in this city, to large donations made by the living, and large bequests left by the dead, to benevolent societies. These are good and noble-minded men who bestow these charities, and they bestow them upon worthy objects. But it is remarkable that so little is given to found institutions of art and learning. I know of but two distinguished instances; that of the late Mr. Astor, who left $300,000 to found a public library;* and that of Mr. Cooper, who in his lifetime has contributed an equal amount to found a Lyceum and public lectures for mechanics.t We have no monarchs in this country to do this thing for us; nor do we want them. We have individuals as rich as King Lewis of Bavaria, who could emulate his example. And he, after all, has done more as a man, than as a king. And if rich individuals will not do this, the association of many individuals with moderate means can do it.

In whatever way it is done, it is a most necessary and noble work. To the rich, I would say, love your city, love your homes, and become wise benefactors to your city and your homes. Have a higher ambition than merely to die the richest men. * Appendix III. 36 - Appendix IV.

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How soon your possessions will be dispersed after you are gone-how soon you yourselves will be forgotten if you leave nothing but your money behind you! Now while you are living erect for yourselves obelisks and pyramids, not inscribed with unintelligible hieroglyphics-mere voiceless tombs; but written all over with words of wisdom, presenting forms of beauty, and diffusing for ages, after you have slept your last sleep, the quickening and hallowing influences of truth and goodness, that men may rise up and bless your memories, and repeat your names as charmed words, and gather inspiration to worthy deeds from your example. To all I would say-and especially to the young men, Be not contented-alas! like the great masses of our racemerely to live and die. Life is a glorious gift if you use it worthily. To use it worthily it must not be a separate solitary life, for yourself, or merely in the bosom of your family. It must be a life in the public life-a life of public as well as private duty-a life making its mark upon the community of which each is one. Let each one in his good capacities be a fountain of life sending forth a clear stream into the open sunshine; and let the kindred streams all flow together, to make one broad deep stream, with verdant banks where grow the perennial trees whose leaves and fruits are for the healing of the nations. 37

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APPENDIX. I. I PRUSSIAN SYSTEM OF EDUCATION. IN 1833, M. Victor Cousin, the great French philosopher, published his report on the system of public instruction in Germany, and particularly in Prussia. Sir William Hlamilton, the compeer of Cousin in the walks of philosophy, and on some questions his opponent, reviewed this report in the Edinburgh Review, and thus first called public attention in England and in this country to the German system of education, and to the educational reform then in progress in France. Cousin’s report was also translated by Mrs. Austin, and extensively circulated in England and America. Some years afterwards, Professor Stowe visited Prussia and other parts of Germany, and on his return made a report to the Legislature of Ohio. This report was afterwards reprinted by the Legislature of Massachusetts. Subsequently to this, Horace Mann, having visited the same countries, brought the German system again before the public, and was instrumental in establishing in Massachusetts the first Normal School in our country. Sir William Hamilton opens his review as follows:“The perusal of these documents has afforded us the highest gratification. We regard them as marking an epoch in the progress of national education, and directly conducive to results important not to France only, but to Europe. The institutions of Germany for public instruction we have long known and admired. We saw these institutions accomplishing their end to an extent and to a degree elsewhere unexampled: and were convinced that if other nations attempted an improvement of their educational policy, this could only be accomplished rapidly, surely, and effectually, by adopting, as far as circumstances would permit, a system thus approved by an extensive experience and the most memorable success.’” After noticing the progress of educational reform in France, the distinguished reviewer proceeds: 4

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39 “Such was the memorable progress made previous to the commencement of the present year, when the important law on primary instruction was ratified. But this progress and this law were professedly the offspring of experience. Of what experience? Not of the experience of France,-of the very country whose whole educational system stood in need of creation or reform, but of that country whose institutions for instruction were, by all competent to an opinion, acknowledged to afford the highest model of perfection. In resolving to profit by the experience of the German States, and in particular of Prussia, we cannot too highly applaud the wisdom of the French government. Nor could a wiser choice have been made of an individual to examine the nature of the pattern institutions, and to report in regard to the mode of carrying their accommodation into effect.

M. Cousin, by whose counsel it is probable that the plan was originally recommended, was, in the summer of 1831, commissioned to proceed to Germany; and his observations on the state of education in that country, transmitted from time to time to the Minister of Public Instruction, constitute the present report. No one could certainly have been found better qualified to judge; no one from whom there was less cause to apprehend a partial judgment. A profound and original thinker, a lucid and elegant writer, a scholar equally at home in ancient and modern learning, a philosopher superior to all prejudices of age or country, party or profession, and whose lofty eclecticism, seeking truth under every form of opinion, traces its unity even through the most hostile systems; M.

Cousin was from his universality both of thought and acquirement, the manl in France able adequately to determine what a scheme of national education ought in theory to accomplish; and from his familiarity with German literature and philosophy, prepared to appreciate in all its bearings what the German national education actually performs. Without wavering in our admiration of M. Cousin’s character and genius, we fully expressed on a former occasion our dissent from certain principles of his philosophy; and with the same sincerity we now declare, that from the first page of his report to the last, there is not a statement nor opinion of any moment in which we do not fully and cordially agree. This work indeed recommends itself as one of the most unbiassed wisdom. Once persecuted by the priests, M. Cousin now fearlessly encounters the derision of another party, as the advocate of religious education; nor does the memory of national calamity and of personal wrong withhold him from pronouncing the Prussian government the most enlightened in Europe. He makes no attempt to soothe the

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40 vanity of his countrymen at the expense of truth; and his work is throughout a disinterested -sacrifice of self to the importance of its subject. His ingenuity never tempts him into unnecessary speculation; practice already approved by its result, is alone anxiously proposed for imitation,-relative and gradual; and the strongest metaphysician of France traces the failure of the educational laws of his country to their metaphysical character. The report is precisely what it ought to be-a work of details; but of details so admirably arranged, that they converge naturally of themselves into general views; while the reflections by which they are accompanied, though never superficial, are of such transparent evidence as to command instant and absolute assent. This is indeed shown in the result. The report was published. In defiance of national self-love and the strongest national antipathies, it carried conviction throughout France: a bill framed by its author for primary education, and founded on its conclusions, was almost immediately passed into a law; and M. Cousin himself, now a peer of France, appointed to watch over and direct its execution. Nor could the philosopher have been intrusted with a more congenial office; for, in the language of his own Plato, ’ Man cannot propose a higher and holier object for his study, than education.’ And M.

Cousin’s exertions, we are confident, will be crowned with the success and honor to which they are so well entitled. The benefit of his legislation cannot, indeed, be limited to France: a great example has there been set, which must be elsewhere followed; and other nations with his own will bless the philosopher for their intelligent existence.’ Juventutem recte formlare,’ says Melancthon,‘paulo plus est quam expugnare Trojam;’ and to carry back the education of Prussia into France, afobids a nobler, if a bloodless. triumph, than the trophies of Austerlitz and Jena.” Thus has the Prussian system of education received the unqualified approbation of two of the greatest philosophers living, and two of the most competent judges on the subject of education. Sir William Hamilton is the author of the remarkable articles in the Edinburgh Review on the English Universities, and on the state of education in England generally. These articles, by a profound, just, and severe criticism, have exposed the educational defects of England just as clearly as they have set forth the manifold excellence of the German system. In 1824, in England, out of a population of nine millions and a half, there were two millions without schools for their I

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41 children; and in London alone, over one fourth of the inhabitants were thus destitute. In Prussia, on the contrary, at the same time, there were 25,000 primary teachers, and 1,664,218 children of both sexes, taught in the primary schools. Since that the number has greatly increased. In our own country we have been conforming more and more to the Prussian system in our primary and normal schools; while, omitting the Gymnasia and Universities, we have retained the English collegiate system, adhering to the charmed circle of four years, and vainly endeavoring to press into it all branches of human knowledge. I hope I shall be pardoned for inserting here an extract from a report made to the Board of Regents of the University of Michigan in 1853. “II. The features of the Prussian system may in general be stated as follows: “1. It is idea]. I mean by this, that it does not measure itself by the wants of any mere profession or pursuit.

Its governing principle is not mere commercial utility. It does not inquire how much money will this or that form, this or that degree of education bring. It assumes that men must be educated because they are men, and that they may be fitted to discharge properly all the duties which society imposes upon them. Education is the necessary training of the human being, that without which his proper humanity cannot appear. It is necessary to him, as an-intellectual and moral creature, as air, light, and food are necessary to hinm as a physical creature. “2. It is universal. By this I mean that education is in certain degrees brought over the whole population, and in all degrees is open to all who may choose it, or who are in a condition to avail themselves of it. Every parent in Prussia is compelled to send his children to school until fourteen years of age. There is only one exception: children may enter a manufactory at twelve years of age, but then the proprietor is obliged to provide a school for their further education. When the parent is unable to pay for the education of his children, the State provides for them. The same is true of the Gymnasium. In the University, also, the student may pursue his studies although unable to pay the fees at the time. In this case, he is bound to pay afterwards whenever he gets an employment yielding an income. “Education in general is of three degrees: the primary, which extends to the fourteenth year; the intermediate, which is furnished in the Gymnasium, and comprises a preparation for the University, extending ordinarily to the nineteenth year; and the University, which has no limited term, but affords scope for unlimited progress in knowledge. “There are besides, special schools for Artists, Mechanics, Engineers, Manufacturers, and Agriculturists. These follow the primary

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42 school, or the Gymnasium, and are a sort of University education for pursuits more particularly connected with the construction of public works, the embellishments of taste, and the leading arts of industry. “The Normal Schools are an essential adjunct of the system. Their sole object is to prepare competent teachers for the primary schools. The course extends through three years. A primary school is always connected with the Normal School. In this, during the last year, the Normal scholars are introduced to the practical business of teaching. “3. All the parts are harmonious. There is nothing like conflict in the system. One part cannot live at the expense of another. On the contrary, the parts mutually imply, demand, and sustain each other. The Normal School sustains the Primary School. The Pri mary School culminates in the Gymnasium, the Gymnasium in the University. And the University pours life into the whole. The University furnishes teachers for the Gymnasium and the Normal Schools; raises up professional men and scholars -the men who, understanding the true principles of education, disseminate them; and, in fine, is the great and perennial fountain of knowledge, the alma mater of learned men, and the resplendent sun of the intellectual system. “4. It is thorough. This appears, first, in the fact that no incompetent teachers are admitted into any of the departments of education, while ample preparations are made for securing competent teachers. This, indeed, is the mainspring of the educational system. It is a genera] and common sense principle, that if you would have good work done, you must find a good workman.” “Secondly.

The educational course is made to extend through a sufficient number of years to enable the work of education to be properly conducted and completed. “Thljirdly. The principles of education have been investigated, and education itself is thus reduced to a science and an art. Hence the branches of knowledge are made to follow each other in due order and proportion, and the methods of instruction are based upon the constitution of the human mind. “Fourthly. Every necessary appliance is provided in libraries, apparatus, and models, so that every form of knowledge may be reached and illustrated. “Lastly. A public opinion has been created which, on the one hand, frowns upon shallow pretension and sciolism and debars from rank, dignity, and influence the man who is ambitious of distinction without possessing the qualifications which entitle him to it: and which, on the other hand, reverences and honors genius, talent, and learning.

Alexander Von HIumboldt, at this moment, is, in the estimation of his countrymen, the most princely man in Prussia. “5. It is practical. This does not contradict the ideal character upon which I have remarked above.

The man, when he is truly educated as a man, is best fitted for all the duties of a man, and for all the employments of human life. In accordance with this, while the ideal conception determines the aim, the method, and the means,

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43 you perceive that the Prussian system takes particular cognizance of all the forms of human activity-of all the arts of industry. The Royal Artisans’ Institute, of Berlin, is furnished with the most able teachers, with a complete library and scientific periodicals, wi h workshops and models, with laboratories, and philosophical apparatus; and sends out from year to year the best practical chemists, engineers, and house builders.

The Royal Academy of Arts, which affords the best instruction in the arts of design, was attended, when I was there, by two hundred artists, and thirteen hundred mechanics. Indeed, throughout the kingdom, there are schools of this descrition which are dependencies of the large institutions of the Capital. “The result is seen in the substantial and elegant character of their public works, in the perfection of their manufactures and all the products of the mechanical arts, and in that wonderful agriculture which extorts plenty from a barren soil. Prussia labors under the disadvantages of a despotic government with an expensive court, a large standing army, and the consequent imposition of burdensome taxes; and yet the cities, villages, and open country exhibit unquestionable signs of prosperity. “Berlin, an inland city, is at this moment rapidly growing by the force of industrial activity. The seat of a great University and of every description of schools, the city of world-renowned scholars, is also a city of merchants, manufacturers, and mechanics. The intellectual life is the very life of national prosperity.

“6. It is economical. Primary School education, we have said, is universal. No one can escape from it. Education in the Gyinnasiumn must likewise be accessible to a very large portion of the population, since it costs only about sixteen dollars a year. And let it be recollected that this education is fully equal to what is g(ained in our colleges. This may be taken as a type of the whole, including the Universities. In no part of the world, I believe, is education so cheap, except where it is entirely gratuitous. “Board and lodging for students in the Prussian towns is correspondingly cheap. The economy of education, as well as the taste for it, will go to account for the large number of students who frequent the Universities. “7. It possesses freedom. I do not mean by this a freedom of idleness, recklessness, and folly, and consequent ignorance and ignonminy; but freedom of choice and of thought in the pursuit of knowledge. In the Primary and Normal schools, and Gymnasiumn, there is a strict method and discipline, one calculated to insure the end contetnplated. And yet there is a genial air thrown over the whole. The students appear happy, because their pursuits are noble, and are conducted in such a way as to give a constant sense of success. The strictness does not lie in any arbitrary imposition, but in the thing itself. Study in its very nature is strict, for it consists in attention and thought. Education implies, necessarily, an observance of order and rule, for it is a normal exercise of the mental faculties for the purpose of developing them. Now the Prussian system leads, guides, and commands without violence and tyranny, because, adapt

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44 ing itself to the nature of the human mind, it determines it to education through that very exercise of the attention and the reasoning power in which are realized the personal freedom of the human being. “The course in the Gymnasium is calculated not only for the attainment of a certain amount of knowledge, but also for the attainment of the art of study and investigation. Then, when the student leaves the Gymnasium and enters the University a new sphere is opened to him, and new methods are propounded adapted to the culture he has already gained. “Having surveyed the field of knowledge, and secured its fundamental elements, and acquired the art of study, he is now prepared to work out a course for himself.

Here are before him eminent professors delivering lectures on every branch of human knowledge. Here is provided a library and every means of investigation to meet his utmost wishes and wants. Henceforth, to the end of life, he must conduct his own education; and he is introduced to the higher responsibilities of this manly and independent career under the auspices of the Universitv. He now chooses for himself, and acts for himself, but in an open field, and under a clear sunlight. The scene is one of perfect intellectual freedom on all hands. The professors are under no restriction in thinking, discussing, and lecturing. The student is under no compulsion in his choice of professors, subjects of study, books, and methods of investigation, He may be as self-determined and original as he pleases. The very air of a German University breathes of fireedom, and nothing but freedom. Indeed the intellectual fireedom has not unfrequently wandered into the region of politics, and the government has been startled by the free and noble play of the creatures which it had itself turned loose into the verdant pastures of truth.* “In the University every student may study what he pleases, and as long as he pleases. He may devote himself to philosophy, to a particular science, or to preparation for a profession. If he wishes to take a degree or to enter upon a profession, then he must pass the ordeal of a very rigid examination. He is firee to study, but if he aim at a definite end, he knows he must prepare for it. He is under the same responsibilities which meet us throughout life, where we indeed form our own characters and shape our own course, but under a moral certainty that we shall reap as we sow.” * It has been charged against Prussia that her Primary schools are mere instruments of despotism, and that hence the whole system of Education is radically corrupt. That allegiance to the King is there taught, cannot be denied. If beyond this there are principles infused into the course of instruction calculated to degrade the people, it is only as an abuse which might be practiced under any system of Education in a despotic country, and has nothing to do with the system itself. The pedagogical character of the system is one thing, the political and religious principles taught are quite another thing. When we adopt the Prussian system of Education, it does not follow that we must use the books, and teach allegiance to the King of Prussia.

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45 II. LONDON. THE Royal Society of London is one of the highest dignity.

It does not, however, belong peculiarly to London, but is national in its character, its most eminent members often having their residence out of the city. The same is true of the learned societies of London generally.

They meet in London, as Parliament meets there, because there is the great national centre. They collect learned men there at stated times, they may lead some to make it their permanent residence, they exert an influence more or less extensive upon society; but they cannot be said to give a character to London like that which the University of Edinburgh gives to Edinburgh, the University of Paris to Paris, and the University of Berlin to Berlin. Nothing in a great city can take the place of a great University. This alone can adequately collect learned men, give them a permanent residence, and enable them to exert their proper influence upon the community. A University, according to its proper definition, is a collection of eminent scholars in every department of learning, associated for the two-fold purpose of advancing knowledge, and educating men.

Learned societies naturally springout of them and cannot exist without them. Hence a city of learned societies without a University must collect its members from abroad. Even large libraries, like that of the British Museum, cannot reach their proper efficiency when not directly connected with Universities; for the latter supply the men who can put the former to account. A large library without a corresponding University, is like a vast machine shop without workmen. Here and there an ingenious individual may be found who will go in and make some practical use of the tools; but this will furnish a poor substitute for the regular and steady workmen. In speaking of London it will be seen that we have compared her only with other European cities. The comparison will be more to her advantage if we compare her with the great Commercial Emporium of our own continent. New York, as a seat of commerce, is second only to London; and the day perhaps is not far distant when she may become the first commercial city of the world. At the present rate of increase, it has been calculated that at the close of the present century New York will contain five millions of inhabitants. But New York is more purely and in

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46 tensely commercial than London. Perhaps no city was ever so exclusively commercial, if we except ancient Carthage. In the higher forms of culture, in learned societies, in a taste for the arts, and in museums and libraries,* New York not only falls far behind London, at the present time, but it must be confessed also that indications of advancing upon’London in these respects, in the future, are not apparent. The commercial competition is unquestionable, but nothing farther than this can be affirmed. The difference between the Crystal Palace of New York and that of London, in its beginning, progress, and ending, is one of those facts which are said to speak volumes. Both palaces were built by private subscription. The London Palace, 1851 feet long, 408 wide, and covering eighteen acres of ground, and filled with noble specimens of the industrial and plastic arts of all nations, met the expectations of its founders, and was completely successful. But this wonderful enterprise was only introductory to another still more wonderful. The palace has been removed and reconstructed on an enlarged plan at Sydenham, where three hundred acres of ground have been purchased for a r)ark. This, too, is the work of a company of stocklholders. The design was “to formt a palace-the first marvellous example of a new style of architecture-for the multitude, where at all times protected from the inclement varieties of the English climate, healthful exercise and wholesome recreation should be easily attainable; to raise the enjoyments and amusements of the English people, and especially to afford to the inhabitants of London, in wholesome country air, amidst the beauties of nature, the elevating treasures of art and the instructive marvels of science, an accessible and inexpensive substitute for the injurious and debasing amusements of a crowded metropolis; to blend them instruction with pleasure, to educate them by the eye, to quicken and purify their taste by the habit of recognising the beautiful; to place them amidst the trees, flowers, and plants of all countries and of all climates, and to attract them to the study of the natural sciences, by displaying their most interesting examples, and making known all the achievements of modern industry, and the marvels of mechanical manufactures.” In two years this building has been completed, extending over three quarters of a mile of ground, and covering an area of nearly six hundred thousand superficial feet. The park is improved; agents have been employed to obtain col * The Astor Library is an exception.

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47 lections and to make casts in all parts of the world. Already it has become a vast museum. A recent traveller, a correspondent of the New York Evangelist, remarks, “The Crystal Palace at Sydenham alone is worth a trip to Europe. Such a collection and reproduction of the wonders of the world has never been seen before. You may spend there days and weeks and months in the study of the works of nature and art, representing the most distant climes, and all the ages of history, from the first dawn of civilization to the immediate present. Only the universal culture of our century could conceive the idea of such a microcosmos; and only by a nation like the English, and in a city like London, could it be carried into actual existence.” The Crystal Palace of New York was at best a diminutive imitation of the one in London. As an exhibition of industrial and artistic works it was imperfect; as a stock operation, a failure, which even the tact of Barnum could not retrieve: its final destination is an unsolved problem, but it gives no promise of being even a diminutive imitation of Sydenham. Such a park] and such a palace, containing such treasures of nature and art, would be of no less value to our country, and to New York in particular, than to England and London; nay, an exhibition one-fifth in magnitude-and New York is more than one-fifth of London-would be of incalculable importance to the population of our metropolis. But where is the company to create even a miniature of Svdenham in the vicinity of New York? Some will cross the Atlanltic to see this new wonder, and return to say, with the traveller above quoted, “Only by a nation like the English, and a city like London, could the idea of such a microcosmos be carried into actual existence.” III. A UNIVERSITY IN NEW

YORK. New York, together with the cities on the opposite shores, which indeed are but an outgrowth of itself, contains some 800,000 inhabitants.

It is not improbable that the close of our century will witness four or five millions of people congregated here. Whatan amazing city! The influences which are to guide and control this mass of energetic life ought to be brought into operation without delay. We have spoken of the necessity of the higher forms 0.

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48 of culture, and of the institutions which can alone create it. At the head of these institutions stands the University. Science, literature, and the arts can be effectually advanced, and their spirit infused into society, only by means of an institution which forms the great laboratory of thought, contains the representative men of all branches of knowledge, and multiplies indefinitely the educated class-. As yet New York has nothing that even approaches to a University. It has only three colleges, containing altogether some four hundred students. It possesses indeed a noble system of primary education, and is fast multiplying its normal schools; but beyond this, very little has been accomplished. But a basis is here laid for a grand system of public instruction, which may easily be made to culminate in a university. We would propose the following plan: First, let the colleges now in existence abolish the four years’ course, and incorporatinginto themselves the grammarschool department, enlarge themselves to the compass of the German Gymnasia. They will thus have a beginning, a middle, and an end, where the number of classes and the years embraced by the course of study shall be determined by the nature of the studies pursued and the discipline to be achieved. The number of these institutions would naturally be increased, and the city itself might be led to create other free academies. Berlin, with little more than 400,000
inhabitants, has seven gymnasia, which together contain about 3,500
students. It may easily be imagined, therefore, how the gymnasia of New York might be increased, with its rapidly increasing population. It would be a noble work for the colleges now in existence, to lead on this new development. The connection between the primary schools and the colleges or gymnasia now becomes clear and natural, for now a rational gradation exists. Secondly, let a proper University be at once created, on a scale commensurate with the wants and the magnificence of our great metropolis.

A great University would commend itself to the notice, and attract the patronage of wealthy and liberal men. It would be an object of national pride and ambition. An institution on a diminutive scale would excite but little interest, and be easily overlooked. The Astor Library gives sure promises of becoming one of the great libraries of the world. Here. then, we have already provided a grand centre for our University. This library is on too lofty a scale to become a mere circulating library. It is designed to be a library for scholars. But as such it cannot answer its end, unless a University be gathered around Ji

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49. it. It siould’ be the library of the entire University of New York, or it may be of the Astor University. It is a magnificent beginning, which demands a corresponding completion. Its very existence contains an inspiration. Is not the spirit, as well as the wealth which created it, an inheritance? Who will begin the great work? If but one man could be found to begin it, his example would electrify hundreds. Is it not plain now that the public schools, the colleges, and the University, would form one grand system, sustaining each other, pouring lifb into each other, and co-working to one great end? Let the highest institution take the initiative. This, once brought into existence, would mould into proper forms all the other grades, and perfect them. The history of education shows us that the highest institutions have ever led on the educational development. THE ROYAL A’TISANS’ INSTITUTE OF BERLIN. WE have referred to the institution which Mr. Cooper has founded in New York for mechanics.

This has suggested to us to give some account of a like institution in Berlin. The Royal In’stitute for Artizans is supported: in part by the government, and in part by the avails of a legacy of $225,000. It forms-the culminating point of a system of education for engineers-and: mechanics. In all the provinces, there are provincial artisan schools designed especially for mechanics. From these ascertain number of pupils are selected’according to merit, and permitted to enter the higher institute in Berlin. The number of students in the Royal Institute is limited’ to two hundred. About forty of these are supported in. full.

Strangers are also admitted without any charge for tuition. Of those who enter regularly on the foundation, it is-required that they shall have reached seventeen years of! age, shall have studied the elements of chemistry and natural philosophy, -and’all the mathematics, preparatory to a commencement of the Calculus, and also shall have worked one year at some mechanic art. The course upon which they enter at” the Royal Institute oomprises three years. The first year, they pursue in com 41 0.

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50 mon a course in mathematics, physical science, and drawing. At the second year they are divided into three classes, each student selecting his class tlhe class of chemists, the class of engineers, -and the class of meclai-iics, or perhaps inore prot)erly the class of house-buildeis.

Thle secoi(l year is slteit in st(udies ac or”dig w ith these three diviionts. 1)uring the thild year, wvorik and stuldy are conjoined: the ciderlists sliered a p)artof every day in thle laborat(or,, it) m:~kiialtOysCes, anid ind(ced in every formi of ivialil.ult.ti,n under thle direction of tl!e professor of chemisitry; tihe eigiiieers are in the wvork-slhop eluguaged in makling mac!li-)ery, steanengi,ines, &c.; and the liouse-build(lers nim;le models of every (dscription of building or )arts of the same, ond mould inI clay va.rious architectural ornameuts. Tlheie are rooms also vhlere nmoul(ls.,re fii’a-,ed fi)r enstiligs. Kiss, the celebr‘4ted nutlhor (of t le lo,ble group in I)ronze, of the A-nazon and(
tlhe Tiger, wNlIich st.;n(ls iln ii ot t()t the Mtiseum, gives instrluction in in(ul(lio( figiures, arcliitectiral ornaments, and various models for bronze ancl iron enstiligs. R.mimelsberg, a distinguished p1rofeZssor (f cliemristrv ill the University, gives il)strtetionl in this department i) thle Iistitute. Tlie instructors are generally able men. All the a)tparatus iand p’eparatiois are on an.mple scale. Tlhe chi-eniical laboratory for the use of the students is large and fully furnished.

Tilere is also a laboratory wlhere Ilan,rnelsberg gives his lectures; and in a(d(litioi to tl-his hle lias!is o\nl private laboratory. qThe worlk-shops are all large an(d com lod(ious, and contain a great deal of machinery, worked by a steamr engine. lfodels are made at tlhe Institute for tlhe use of the provincial schools. Thiere is a room for engrnrving,; there is another-for weaving, patterns of various faitbics; ai(l tlhere is a large room filled witli models of mncliiiiery and buildiugs. The department of natural plilosoq)liy is provided witlh a very complete set of al)parnatos. In draw ing the instruction is very tlhorough. Conntected with thiis del)artmeint is a fine gallery filled withi casts in Iplaster of some of the most celebrated pieces of ancient and modeirn sculp ture.

A-ndl, besides all this, there is a library well furnishled with books relating to the subjects of study; and a readiIng room contatining all the best scientific journals of Germany, France, Englaind, and America.

Everything seems to be provided that could be desired. It is a perfect institution of the kin d.

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