The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1888-05-05
MODEST CHICAGO.

Following are extracts from Mr..
Charles Dudley Warmers article in the
May Harper on Chicago: Chicago Is be-
coming modest. Perhaps the inhabitants
may still be able to conceal their nodesty,
but nevertheless they feel it. The expla-
nation is simple. The city has grown
not only beyond the most .sangline ex-
pectations of those who indulged in the
most inflated hope of it's future, but it
has grown beyond what they said they
expected. This gives the citizens pause
as it might an eagle that laid a roc's egg.
The fact is, Chicago has become al in
dependent organism, growing by COM
bination Of forces and opportunities be
yond the contrivance of any combina-
ton of men to help or hinder, beyond
the need of flaming circulars and reports
OF boards of trade, and process pictures.
1t has passed the danger of the fear of
rivalry. and reached the point where the
growth of any other portion Of the great
Northwest, or of any city in it (whatever
rivalry that city may show in industries
or III commerce), Is III some way a contri-
button to the power and wealth OF Chica-
60. To them that have shall be given.
Cities, under feyoring conditions for
local expansion, which reach certain
amount of population and wealth, grow
by kind of natural increment, the law
of attraction, very well known in human
nature, which draws person to an act
i've city of two hundred thousand rather
than to a stagnant city Of one hundred
thousand. And it is a fortunate thing
for civilization that this attraction is al.
most as strong to men of letters as it is
to men of affairs. Chicago has, it seems
to me, only recently turned this point Of
assured expansion, and, as 1 intimsted,
the inhabitants have hardly yet become
accustomed to this idea; but l believe
the time is near, when they will be as in
different to what strangers think of Chi.
cRgo as the New Workers are to what
York is to-day the only American city
| free from this anxious note of provin-
cialism - though in Boston it rather
takes the form Of pity, for the uuenligdt-
ened man who doubts its superiority;
but the impartial student OF Chicago to-
day can ses plenty OF signs of the sure
growth of this metropolitan Indifference.
And yet there is still enough of the old
Chicago stamp to make the place in
teresting.
1t Is everything in getting a point Of
view. Last summer lady of New Or.
leans who had never before been out of
her native French city, and who would look
upon the whole North with the impartial
eyes Of a foreigner-and more than that,
with Continental eyes-visited Chicago
and atterward New York. (Which city
did you like best?" 1 asked, without tax
ing myself seriously in the question. To
my surprise, she hesitated. This hesita-
tion was fatal to all my preconceived no
tiOns. 1t mattered not thereafter which
she preferred; she had hesitated. She
was actually comparing Chicago to New
York in her mind, as one might compare
Paris and London. The audacity Of
the comparison 1 saw was excused by its
innocence. / confess that it had never
occurred TO me to think Of Chicago in
that Continental light. "Well, /" she said,
not seeing at 1.-the humor Of my remark,
"Chicago seems to me TO have finer
buildings and residences, to be the more
beautiful city; but of course there is