Part 20 (2/2)
295. =The Value of the Press.=--The most valuable service rendered by the press is its education of the public mind, so that public opinion may register itself in intelligent action. It provides a forum for the discussion of issues that divide sects and parties, and helps to preserve religious freedom and popular government. Except that it is so frequently trammelled in uttering itself frankly on important public questions, it gives an indication of the trend of sentiment and so makes possible a forecast of future public action. The very variety of printed publications, from the sensational daily sheet to the published proceedings of a learned society, insures a healthy interchange of ideas that helps to level social inequalities and promotes a mutual understanding among all groups and grades of society. The cheapened process of book publication on a large scale, and the investment of large sums of money in the publis.h.i.+ng business, with its mechanics of sale management as well as printing, has made possible an enormous output of literature on all subjects and has widened the range of general information in possession of the public.
The whole system of modern life would be impossible without the press.
296. =The Library and the Museum.=--In spite of the efficient methods used for selling the output of the press, large numbers of books would be little read were it not for the collections of books that are available to the public, either free or at small cost. The public library is an educative agency that serves its const.i.tuency as faithfully as the school and the press. Its presence for use is one of the advantages that the city has over the country, though the public library has been extended far within one or two decades. The child goes from home to school and widens the circle of his acquaintances in the community; through the daily newspaper the adult gets into touch with a far wider environment, reaching even across the oceans; in the library any person, without respect to age, color, or condition, if only he possess the key of literacy to unlock knowledge, can travel to the utmost limits of continents and seas, can dig with the geologist below the surface, or soar with the astronomer beyond the limits of aviation, can hob-n.o.b with ancient worthies or sit at the feet of the latest novelist or philosopher, and can learn how to rule empires from as good text-books as kings or patriarchs possess.
What the library does for intellectual satisfaction the museum and art-gallery do for aesthetic appreciation. They make their appeal to the love of beauty in form, color, or weave, and call out oftentimes the best efforts of an individual's own genius. Often the gift of one or more public-spirited citizens, they register a disposition to serve society that is sometimes as useful as charity. Philanthropy that uplifts the mind of the recipient is as desirable as benevolence that plans bodily relief; the soul that is filled has as much cause to bless its minister as the stomach that is relieved of hunger. The picture-galleries of Europe, the tapestries, the metal and wood work, the engravings, and the frescoes, are the precious legacy of the past to the present, not easily reproduced, but serving as a continual incentive to modern production. They set in motion spiritual forces that uplift and expand the human mind and spur it to future achievement.
297. =Music and the Drama.=--Music and the drama have a similar stimulating and refining influence when they are not debauched by a sordid commercialism. They strengthen the n.o.blest impulses, stir the blood to worthy deeds by their rhythmic or pictorial influence, unite individual hearts in wors.h.i.+p or play, throb in unison with the sentiments that through all time have swayed human life. Often they have catered to the lower instincts, and have served for cheap amus.e.m.e.nt or entertainment not worth while, but concert-hall and theatre alike are capable of an educative work that can hardly be equalled elsewhere. When in combination they appeal to both eye and ear, they provide avenues for intellectual understanding and activity that neither school nor press can parallel. Recent mechanical inventions, such as automatic musical instruments and moving pictures, have added greatly to the range and effectiveness of music and the drama, but they only intensify and popularize the appeal to the senses. It is to be remembered that individual and social stimuli must be varied enough to touch men at all points and call out a response from every faculty of their nature. These arts, therefore, that make life real and socialize it and cheer men and women on their way, play a vital part in the education of society and deserve as serious consideration as the other educational agencies and inst.i.tutions that find a place in the social economy of the community. Numerous amateur musical and dramatic societies testify to the interest of the people in these refined arts.
298. =The Need of Social Centres.=--Books and pictures, music and the drama are so many mild stimulants to those who use and appreciate them, but there are large numbers of people who rarely read anything but the newspaper, and who attend only cheap entertainments. These people need a spur to high thoughts and n.o.ble action, but they do not move in the world of culture. They need a stronger stimulant, the tang of virile debate about questions that touch closely their daily concerns, discussions in which they can share if they feel disposed.
In large circles of the city's population there is a lack of facilities for such public discussion, and for that reason the people fall back on the prejudices of the newspapers for the formation of their opinions on public questions. Disputes sometimes wax warm in the saloon about the merits of a pugilist or baseball-player; questions of the rights of labor are aired in the talk of the trade-union headquarters; but the vital issues of city, state, and nation, and the underlying principles that are at stake find few avenues to the minds of the ma.s.s of the people. In the country the town meeting or the gathering at the district schoolhouse provides an occasional opportunity, or the grange meeting supplies a forum for its members, but even there the rank and file of the people do not talk over large questions often enough. In the city the need is great.
299. =The City Neighborhood.=--It is well understood that large cities have most of their public buildings and business structures in one quarter, and their residences in another; also that the character of the residential districts varies according to the wealth and culture of their inhabitants or the nationality and occupation to which they belong. The city is a coalition of semidetached groups, each of which has a unity of its own. The necessities of work draw all the people together down-town along the lines of streets and railways; now and then the different cla.s.ses are shaken together in elevators and subways; but when they are free to follow their own volition they flow apart. Those who are on terms of intimacy live in a neighboring street; the grocer from whom they buy is at the corner; the school where their children go is within a few blocks; the theatre they patronize or the church they attend is not far away; the physician they employ lives in the neighborhood. Except the few who get about easily in their own conveyances and have a wide acquaintance, city dwellers have all but their business interests in the district in which they live, and which is seldom over a square mile in extent.
Some munic.i.p.alities are coming to see that each district is a neighborhood in itself and needs all the democratic inst.i.tutions of a neighborhood. Among these belongs the a.s.sembly hall for free speech.
It may well become a centre for a variety of social purposes, but it is fundamentally important that it provide a forum for public discussion. As the rich man has his club where he may meet the globetrotter or the leader of public affairs distinguished in his own country, and as the woman's club of high-minded women has its own lecturers and celebrities of all kinds, so the working man and his wife have a right to come into contact with stimulating personalities who will talk to them and to whom they can talk back.
300. =Forum for Public Discussion.=--Such democratic gatherings fall into two cla.s.ses. There is the public lecture or address, after which an opportunity for questions and public discussion is given, and there is the neighborhood forum or town meeting, at which a question of general interest is taken up and debated in regular parliamentary fas.h.i.+on. In a number of cities both plans have been adopted. On a Sunday afternoon or evening, or at a convenient time on another evening of the week, a popular speaker addresses the audience on a theme of social interest, after it has been entertained for a half hour with music; following the address a brief intermission allows for relaxation, and then for an hour the question goes to the house, and free discussion takes place under the direction of the leader of the meeting. Sometimes series of this sort are supplied by churches or other social organizations; in that case many of the speakers are clergymen, and in some forums the topics are connected with religious or strictly moral interests; but even then the discussion is on the broad plane of the common concerns of humanity, and there is a zest to the occasion that the ordinary religious gathering does not inspire.
The second plan is modelled after the old-fas.h.i.+oned town meeting that was transplanted from the mother country to New England, and has spread to other parts of the United States. It is a gathering of all who wish to discuss freely some question that interests them all, and it is more strictly co-operative than the first plan, for there is no one speaker to contribute the main part of the debate, but each may make his own contribution, and by the power of his own persuasion win for his argument the decision of the meeting. Besides stimulating the interest of those who take part, such a debate is a most effective educator of the public mind in matters of social weal.
READING REFERENCES
HENDERSON: _Social Elements_, pages 228-253.
KING: _Social Aspects of Education_, pages 65-97, 264-290.
WARD: _The Social Center_, pages 212-251.
WOLFE: _The Lodging House Problem_, pages 109-114.
_Addresses and Proceedings of the National Education a.s.sociation, 1905_, pages 644-650, ”Music as a Factor in Culture.”
CHAPTER x.x.xVIII
THE CHURCH
301. =The Place of the Church in the Urban Community.=--In the city, as in the country, the religious instinct expresses itself socially through the inst.i.tution of the church or synagogue. Spiritual force cannot be confined within the limits of a single inst.i.tution; religion is a dynamic that permeates the life of society; yet in this age of specialization, and especially in a country like the United States, where religion is a voluntary affair, not to be entangled with the school or the State, religion has naturally exerted its influence most directly through the church. Charity and settlement workers are inspired by a religion that makes humanitarianism a part of its creed, and a large majority of them are church members, but as a rule they do not attempt to introduce any religious forms or exercises into their programmes. Most public-school teachers have their religious connections and recognize the important place of religion in moulding character, but religious teaching is not included in the curriculum because of the recognized principle of complete religious liberty and the separation of church and state. The result has been that religion is not consciously felt as a vital force among many people who axe not directly connected with an ecclesiastical inst.i.tution. Those who are definitely connected with the church in America contribute voluntarily to its expenses, sometimes even at personal sacrifice. Most people who have little religious interest realize the value of the mere presence of a meeting-house in the community as a reminder of moral obligations and an insurance against disorder. Its spire seems to point the way to heaven, and to make a mute appeal to the best motives and the highest ideals. The decline of the church is, therefore, regarded as a sign of social degeneracy.
302. =Wors.h.i.+p and Church Attendance.=--The church exists in the city because it has certain specific functions to perform. To maintain public wors.h.i.+p, to persuade to definite convictions and inspire to n.o.ble conduct, to furnish religious education, and to promote social reform are its essential responsibilities. Wors.h.i.+p is a natural att.i.tude to the individual who is prompted by a desire to adjust himself to the universe and to obtain the peace of mind that follows upon the establishment of a right relations.h.i.+p. To most people it is easier to get into the proper atmosphere and spirit of wors.h.i.+p in a public a.s.sembly, and they therefore are accustomed to meet at stated intervals and bow side by side as if in kins.h.i.+p together before the Unseen. Long-established habit and a superst.i.tious fear of the consequences that may follow neglect keep some persons regular in church attendance when they have no sense of spiritual satisfaction in wors.h.i.+p. Others go to church because of the social opportunities that are present in any public gathering.
In recent years church attendance has not kept pace with the increasing population of the city. A certain pride of intellect and a feeling of security in the growing power of man over nature has produced an indifference to religion and religious teachers.
Multiplicity of other interests overshadows the ecclesiastical interests of the aristocracy; fatigue and hostility to an inst.i.tution that they think caters to the rich keeps the proletariat at home. In addition the tendency of foreigners is to throw off religion along with other compulsory things that belonged to the Old World life and to add to the number of the unchurched.
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