THE URBAN COMMUNITY AND SOCIAL SCIENCE 767 



is not even noticed, because it does not occur any more to any one 

 that the powerful accomplishments of modern technic in water-supply 

 and canalization are only common activities of housekeeping. 



II 



As the little cell of the family exists beneath the urban community, 

 so there is, above it, the great encompassing circle of the state. 

 (Department 20, Section C, " National Administration"). Here, how- 

 ever, the features of a uniform typical picture cannot be ascertained; 

 but two absolutely different cases must be distinguished: First, the 

 state, extended over wide areas which needs a division into provinces 

 for its own purpose. Even if a subdivision is made, the smallest 

 district will still be apt to contain several settlements. By mere self- 

 division a state does not yet attain to formation of communities; an 

 urban community cannot be spoken of, because there does not exist 

 any local community. In this wise, we must think, the old division 

 into counties and hundreds in entire western Europe was made in 

 the epoch when the Roman-Germanic states were constituted. If 

 in reality sometimes the smallest district, the hundred, coincided 

 with a settlement, it was a mere accident. This can still be seen 

 in countries where the constitution of the parish depends upon 

 geographical division. Even the smallest district, the parish, 

 comprises the parochial village with the filial villages. By accident 

 the entire parish may be one settlement, no more nor less; but 

 usually either the parish will comprise several settlements, or a large 

 urban settlement will be divided into several parishes. 



The opposite extreme we find, if the community itself is the state. 

 The classical example for this city-state is Athens. Here the com- 

 monwealth has never been anything else but the community of the 

 Athenian citizens. The market-place where they assembled to dis- 

 cuss the affairs of their community and their environs remained 

 the centre in which the most important affairs of an insular empire 

 were decided, whose members are considered only allies of the 

 Athenians. In a greater measure the same was repeated at Rome. 

 The city of Rome remained the Roman commonwealth (republica 

 Romano). Only he who possessed citizen's rights in this city was 

 a citizen of the empire. In order to appease the revolting Itali, who 

 wanted to have their share in the government, no other means 

 could be found than to grant them citizens' rights in the city of 

 Rome. And the unity of the empire, as it was understood since 

 Caracalla, was only founded upon the fact that every inhabitant of 

 each province of the far-spread empire was simultaneously a citizen 

 of the city of Rome. While city and family stood in close relations 

 from the very beginning, the relations between state and city cannot 



