5. A Provisional Definition of the Settlement.. UNIVERSITY, COLLEGE AND SOCIAL SETTLEMENTS. PART I. SECTION I.-HISTORICAL INTRODUCTION. INDUSTRIAL CHANGES.-Economic conditions determine the possibilities of social development and modify the forms of life. The rise of the Great Industry is one of the most striking and influential facts of the century. Less frequently than formerly do we see the small group of workers carrying on industries in homes and shops, and using simple and cheap tools which belong to themselves; but we now see regiments of wage-workers busy with costly and complicated machines. These machines are driven by tireless steam-engines and electric currents. The operative owns and controls nothing. The employer controls the instruments of production. When the manager closes his factory because profits are not satisfactory, thousands of families face starvation and the door of the world of industry is barred. The artizan of the city has not even a garden-patch on which he can raise vegetables. He is entirely dependent on the market, and must pay cash for all he eats or wears. A few "belated industries," like plain sewing, are carried on at home, but these are apt to be the most exposed to the evils of sweating. The modern organization of industry has divided the breadwinners into two camps, managers and wage-earners. The division aggravates, if it does not cause, class distinctions and hostilities. The harsher features of the system seem to be yielding to organization, restrictive legislation and enlightened philanthropy, but the contrasts between rich and poor are absolutely greater than ever before. MUNICIPAL, DEVELOPMENT.-Towns are machinemade. Troops of laborers gather about the steamengine and build or rent homes near the great factory. Cities are the ganglia of the network of railroads, the points where communication is broken and renewed, where freight and passengers are redistributed. All modern countries witness the rapid growth of large towns. The extension of cities is a curious study. The choice building-sites by lake, park or forest are taken up by successful managers, bankers, merchants and professional people. The less desirable lots, on low damp ground, distant from woods and water, are left to wage-earners. The rejected portions are laid out in narrow lots, many of them fronting on alleys, and the number of children is usually in inverse ratio of space occupied. The worst parts come to be called the slums. The managing and operative classes are separated in the shop and isolated in resideTheir separ ation accentuates the causes of suspicion, bitterness, envy and misunderstanding. The city comes to be a huge aggregation of villages, each with distinct and antagonistic ideals. Communication becomes difficult. The very fact that the wealthy approve a measure, and that it is advocated by the “great dailies," is frequently enough to defeat it at the polls. The following description of the situation about the Bermondsey Settlement might be applied to some portions of the largest American cities. "All that we are, for the present, striving for is that poorer London should come to have the same advantages as provincial towns of moderate size. The population which our work affects in Bermondsey, Rotherhithe and the river side parishes, is not much less than 150,000. Contrast it with provincial towns of that size. There wealth and poverty are neighbors. The rich worship with the poor; their wealth builds and sustains churches, in which their families work. Institutions-educational, medical and charitable-spring up from the generosity of wealthy and enlightened citizens. Generation after generation, their families contribute to the administration of public affairs and philanthropic undertakings the service which only education, leisure, riches and highly-trained Christian character can give. And hence the solidarity, the esprit de corps, the local pride which such towns display. How different is South London, with its churches starved because members and money have removed, almost entirely unblessed by the |