82 HUXLEY MEMORIAL LECTURES 



plans will be struggles towards an unknown end. 

 They will be like planning a shell for a marine 

 creature of unknown size and habits, like build- 

 ing a house without knowing what sort of a family 

 is to live in it. 



The organizers of that Conference arranged 

 that their proceedings should begin with papers 

 on town-planning in the past, by the Greeks, the 

 Romans and the Europeans of the Renaissance. 

 These predecessors of ours had to face, not pre- 

 cisely our problems, but problems similar to ours. 

 Cities like Rhodes and Antioch, Alexandria and 

 Pergamon were laid out by architects whose 

 technical skill was almost equal to that of their 

 modern successors, and to whom the utmost free- 

 dom was given to make a city, with its walls and 

 market place, its temples, gymnasia and streets, 

 on the most scientific principles. It would be 

 absurd that when a federal capital has to be built 

 for Australia or India, or a great city like Chicago 

 to be spread out on a plain, the lessons of the 

 past should not be used to the utmost, and hints 

 taken from all available records. Surely here is 

 an example which justifies my contention that for 

 wise action in the present, and for far-seeing 

 plans for the future it is above all things neces- 

 sary that our knowledge of man and of his history 

 should be as exact, as detailed and as vivid as 

 possible. 



