770 THE URBAN COMMUNITY 



III 



The urban community which has beneath itself the family and 

 above itself the state, has at its side the rural community. Although 

 much has been written about the difference between urban and rural 

 communities, yet the simple truth should not be forgotten that the 

 natural difference between city and village is in their size. That 

 the city is large and the village is small, nobody will dispute. Only 

 in the question where the limit shall be drawn, the opinions differ. 

 Frequently it is said that only the metropolis, cities with more than 

 one hundred thousand inhabitants, are real cities. This opinion 

 imparts to the word " city " a significance that never before had 

 been attached to it. If the languages of all peoples have formed the 

 word " city " without thinking of a large city, there must be some- 

 thing which the smallest communities (that may still be named 

 cities) have in common with the largest centres of population and 

 which, at the same time, separates them from the still smaller places, 

 the villages. It is not difficult to find it out. One needs only wander 

 from village to village, for a few weeks, and then arrive in a town 

 of two to three thousand inhabitants in order to become aware of 

 the difference. There one can find shelter only through a villager's 

 good will or be received hospitably by some one who only occa- 

 sionally accommodates a transient stranger, though he is not a 

 professional hotel-keeper. Here one finds regular hotels which pro- 

 vide for the stranger. There it is difficult to find a servant who 

 can do the most necessary repairing of clothing, and, in emergencies, as 

 sickness, one is helpless. Here one finds tailors, shoemakers, phy- 

 sicians, druggists, etc. The city begins with the division of labor. 



In this point our subject does not only approach the subject of 

 industrial common life (Department 22, Section D, " The Industrial 

 Group,") and economic history (Department 19, Section A), but also 

 the whole large group of social culture (Division G). I shall add 

 some words about the manifold relations of urban life to social 

 culture. In social regard the city differs from the country in two 

 points: the few inhabitants of a village are, generally considered, 

 homogeneous ; the many inhabitants of the city are dissimilar. 

 These combined factors give the urban community its importance 

 in the cultural movement. 



In the programme of this Congress under " Social Culture " the 

 topics " Education " and " Religion " are discussed. Of the first 

 group, Education (Department 23), we have discussed at length one 

 of the most important points, the School (Section B), as an example to 

 show how the urban community takes its tasks from the familiar 

 community. The school is certainly not an urban, but just as well a 



