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
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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
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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,
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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
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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
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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
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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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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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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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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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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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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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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.
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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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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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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 
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 
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 
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 
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 
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 
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. 
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 
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 
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 
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. 
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 
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. 
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 
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 
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 
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 
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 
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 
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 
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. 
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 
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 
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 
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 
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 
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, 
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 
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 know-ledge, 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 sun-light. 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. 
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 
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. 
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. 
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 
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. 
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 distinguis-hed 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
furnish-ed.  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.