Country and City 73 



The city obligation. 



The country is certain to exercise a profound 

 influence on the city. We now know that the 

 city, with all its wealth of attractions and its 

 suggestions of luxury, leaves some of the 

 highest aspirations unsatisfied. The very in- 

 tensity of the city demands the country as an 

 antidote and corrective. 



On the other hand, the city is to have a most 

 marked influence on the country. The coun- 

 try needs the city. It does not need the city 

 man so much to teach the countryman farming, 

 as to touch and elevate the general currents of 

 all country life. The city man goes to the 

 country with new and large ideas, active touch 

 with great affairs, keen business and executive 

 ability, generosity, altruism, high culture. May 

 we not hope that he will also always go with 

 sympathy ? All these traits will arouse the 

 country from its tendency to complacency and 

 narrowness. The blend should perhaps pro- 

 duce the real American. Certainly the city has 

 a distinct duty to perform toward its contribu- 

 tory country, to help to build it up rather than 



