Massed populations cannot dwell in obscurity. They are the radiating centres of national life.

The rural sections get, not merely their fashions, but their social customs and mold of character from the cities. Cities are moral battle-grounds, potent determining factors of moral progress. The problem of the cities is, therefore, one of the leading problems of our civilization. Under our peculiar civil polity, the solution must come from out of the hearts of the people, by the process of selfgovernment, grounded in intelligence and true virtue.

But first we need to understand the perils of the cities. To unfold these in part (for it can be only partially done, within the limits assigned me, to-day) is my present task. Those who follow, I trust, will discuss other phases of the question.

I. PERIL FROM RAPID GROWTHS OF POPULATIONS.

The tendency to a congestion of populations has been one of the marked phenomena of all history, from the days of Babel to the present time. The teeming populations of Nineveh, Babylon, Carthage, Syracuse and Rome, the cities of Egypt and Greece, are only a few of the more notable of the great centres of the olden times. Nor in our day are these large aggregations of humanity confined to Christian nations. Availing ourselves, as well as we can, of the very imperfect data of non-Christian countries, we find China with 66 cities, whose populations exceed 50,000; 20 exceeding 250,000; and 4 exceeding 1,000,000. India has 25 exceeding 100,000, and 5 exceeding 250,000. Even in Africa, 25 cities exceed 50,000, and 6, 100,000. Japan, with a total population of 36,000,000, holds 2,000,000 in twelve cities of 50,000 and upwards. Even the East Indian Archipelago reports five cities ranging from 50,000 to 160,000 inhabitants. And many entirely barbarous countries are

crowded with swarming masses, living in close contact, though but slightly, if at all, organized as communities.

But it must be confessed that the conditions of the higher Christian civilizations furnish the impulse and also the facilities for larger concentrations of population. While, in Japan, one in 18 of the population are in cities of 50,000 and upwards; in France, the rate is one in 7.5; in the United States one in 7; and in Great Britain, with her more limited territorial area, one in 2.7 inhabitants.

In the United States, these large aggregations of people have been the more remarkable, because of the unparalleled extent of our national area. While the inhabitants have been spreading out into the new Territories, filling up vast solitudes with new, organized communities, so that in the last nine decades the thirteen States increased to 38, and nine great Territories are rapidly maturing to the condition of States, at the same time, the growth of the city populations has been even more wonderful.

At the opening of this century, only six communities of 8,000 inhabitants and over were registered in our national census; the last census numbered 286, with 22.5 per cent. of the total population of the country. The table of the "Fifty Principal Cities," in the last two censuses of the United States, have afforded very impressive exhibits of this important part of our national life. Taking the table for 1880, and constructing similar tables* for the same cities,† in 1870, 1860, 1850 and 1840, we have a good basis for inquiry and deduction. Forty years is a sufficiently long period for testing the questions involved. There are so many temporary ebbs and flows, that shorter periods do not afford satisfactory basis for broad and wise generalizations.

The population of these fifty cities, in forty years, increased sixfold, while that of the whole country increased threefold, or from 7.7 per cent. of the total population of the country in 1840, to 15.5 per cent. in 1880. At the same time the other cities of 8,000 inhabitants and upwards increased in an even larger relative ratio, though in much smaller aggregates.

When we examine the relative increase of these fifty cities in each separate decade, we find the ratio steadily declining. The

*See pp. 743, 744 of the forthcoming volume by the author, entitled, "Christianity in the United States, From the First Settlement to the Present Time." Phillips & Hunt, 805 Broadway, New York City. 8 vo. 795 pp.

San Francisco, Denver, Kansas City, and a few others which did not exist in 1840, are introduced at later dates.

gain from 1840 to 1850, upon the population of 1840, was 78 per cent.; from 1850 to 1860, upon the population of 1850, was 62 per cent.; from 1860 to 1870, upon the population of 1860, was 44 per cent.; from 1870 to 1880, upon the population of 1870, was 37 per cent.

This peculiar exhibit is chiefly due to the large bases on which the percentage is calculated in each successive period, but not altogether. The actual increase also relatively diminishes, and likewise the percentage of gain on the whole population of the country. In each previous decade, the increase of gain on the whole population of the country ranged from two to two and seven-tenths per cent.; but from 1870 to 1880 it was only about three-quarters of one per cent.

While the relative increase of the fifty largest cities has thus declined, during the past forty years, that of the rural populations outside of all cities of 8,000 inhabitants and upwards, if we except the decade of the Civil War, has remained nearly uniform, being 29 per cent. in the first two, and 27 per cent. in the last. But this rural population is all the while concentrating more and more in newly forming centres, soon to be added to the list of cities, thus enhancing the importance of the great problem of the cities.

The fact of the great and rapid growth of these centres of population is not, in itself, an unmixed peril. It has its advantages, bringing people near together, so that they can be easily reached, and making Christian labors less obtrusive and open to carping criticism. I give a typical fact: Said a young lady, a Sundayschool teacher in the country, "If my dozen scholars were in a city, I could save them. I could more readily see them than now, scattered as they are over many square miles, and I could bring my influence to bear upon them, without exciting the gossip and opposition I now encounter, from people who know every move I make." In foreign missionary addresses, we have been accustomed to hear reference to the immense populations of Bombay, Siam and other portions of the globe, crowded into small areas and speaking one language, as an encouraging fact, facilitating the work of evangelization.

The question of peril connected with the large cities starts from this point-the rapid growth of the populations, producing great demands for religious provision. The danger is that churches, Sunday-schools and other religious facilities will not be multiplied

sufficiently; that the number of the religious teachers and Christian people, with their varied religious offices, will be inadequate to the spiritual needs of these thriving communities; or that, in the changes of the population which often take place, from the centres to the suburbs of the cities, the older sections will be left unsupplied with churches and the ordinances of religion. To follow up the growth of these great cities, to furnish them with religious influences, to make lodgments of Christian truth in the hearts of these intensely surging masses, and capture and hold them to Christianity, is a task of no small magnitude.

II. PERIL FROM LARGE ACCESSIONS OF VICIOUS CLASSES. The manifold, large, corrupt elements concentrating in the cities produce hideous congestions of evil, for such the slums may be characterized. These reinforcements come from several sources. Our rural districts send valuable additions of virtue, intelligence, enterprise and real stamina; but other classes of a very different type pour into the cities-uneasy, restless, roving adventurers, needy and greedy men and women, thriftless families, many weary of the sweat of honest toil, many whose growing viciousness shuns the light and gaze of village streets, others whose overmastering propensities to evil break from the restraints of said communities and seek large indulgence; others fleeing from the wreck of better fortunes, and others from the wreck of character. With such tides pouring into them, portions of the cities become large festering, fermenting slums.

Commerce, with its great advantages, brings serious disadvantages to the large maritime cities. With their widely extended commercial intercommunication with the whole world, there comes familiarity with the vices of the nations-an enlarged community of vice. The great seaports absorb the concentrated vices of the world, and, in these days of quick and easy transit, the inland cities and rural towns are easily inoculated with every evil virus known in the world-wide community of iniquity. We have quarantine protection against foreign pestilences, but none against foreign vices.

Furthermore the law of growth inheres in sin. Large aggregates of vicious characters intensify evil, and produce monstrous developments of iniquity. Thus large cities become the strongholds of devildom, where "Satan's seat is," and saloonocracy, prostitution, gambling and a long list of nameless wrongs are rampant. Crime multiplies, thrives, claims and often receives immunity. Lechery

riots and putrefies; groggeries and other dens keep open on Sundays in the face of worthless officials; filthy performances are allowed to draw crowded houses; and elaborately furnished gambling hells flourish unnoticed. The slums are Babels of moral confusion, of manifold tongues and manifold crimes, in crowding regiments, besieging and beating back law and order. These terribly lapsed masses seem utterly void of hope or desire for elevation, indifferent to imitation and instruction, and defiant toward remonstrance and warning.

III. PERIL FROM THE SALOON.

This topic requires treatment here, inasmuch as the saloon holds the centre of its power in the cities. But inasmuch as this topic is to be specially treated as a distinct part of the programme, I will

omit the discussion of it.

IV. THE PERIL OF MISRULE.

The American policy of rule by the people is being put to a severe test. Some time ago we became familiar with the phrase "ring-rule"; but we have passed far down beyond that, and now hear much of "gang-rule," and "thug-rule." In some cities a large part of the primary meetings are held in low saloons, which good citizens will not enter; and hence the administration of city affairs is determined by the lowest and most corrupt elements of the population. The aldermen and councilmen thus nominated and elected, with the police appointed by them, become a corrupt ring, dominated by political and personal considerations, the baseline of which is subserviency, and all questions of character and intelligence are eliminated. The police of some cities, while comprising many persons entitled to much praise, often include others of brutal instincts, incapable of using properly the formidable weapons and authority which the law places in their hands. Political service or the recommendations of saloon-keepers too often determine the appointment of police. It is the old story of the wolves selecting the dogs to guard the sheepfold.

We read every day instances of violence and gang-rule, but only a small percent is supposed to get into the papers. In some river wards, citizens are terrorized by bands of young ruffians, organized for robbery, drunkenness and debauchery, and murder is not an unfrequent incident. The law-abiding inhabitants are