Carolina watchman. [volume] (Salisbury, N.C.) 1871-1937, 1906-09-05

What is known as the urban move
ment. the movement of people from
the farms to the cities and towns,
Derils of the country. 1t is an n
cient danger. Men from the earliest
period have drifted toward the cities.
Aristotle's wisest remark was, per-
haps, the observation that man was
born to be q citizen, that is the deni-
zen of and the active worker in a city.
That also is what civilization means
the Transforming Of men into citi-
zen 1t was Paul's proud boast that
he was the citizen of no mean city.
There is no doubt that in Jul civili-
cation and in our culture the city is
the centre, the heart.
| 1t was the genial Cowper's opin-
ion that the country was the better
place, for the quaint reason that
God made the country, and nan
made the town" A little common
sens would have told him that it
was precisely for this reason that
man preferred the city. The usually
wise Lowell also had a ridiculous no.
ton on the subject. He wrote, BE
fore man made us citizens, great IA
ture made us men" He forgot that
until man had made himself a citizen
he was only half a man, primitive,
savage, barbaric. The city was and is
absolutely necessary. 1t illustrates
a great economic law, that of combi-
nation. Just as m must
corsbine to achieve it's highest and
best results, so man must combine in
order to realize himself, to attain
the best Of which he is possible.
work of developing man in it's human
hothouses; there is now some danger
| that the tendency CT lei to flock to
the big towns will result in the i'm
poverishment of many countries and
in dertiment to the race. The cities,
like all other receptacles, are limited.
They cannot be made to contain more
than their just measure, and in the
OvercroWded cities we see nature re-
tracing her evolutionary processes,
and denaturing men, making them
anemic, degenerate, weaklings, with
out the red blood of a vigorous, life,
and sinking into decay. The cities
cal hold only their allotted share,
and, after all, these must be sup
ported by the country. The culture
and the civilization of this day and
of every other time rests and has
rested upon the farm. The loss of
a stout and prosperous farming class,
as Goldsmith pointed out-though
it had been observed before-"when
once destroyed, "a be sup
Piled No country can be self-sus-
tanning CT therefore really prosper
Gus, without independent, thrifty,
prosperous farmers. The ideal on
! dition would be one in which there
were cities crowded with culture
Bostons, Athens, Parises-surround-
ed by gardens and farms; the cul-
tured life of the metropolis of wealth
and fashion and art, much of its best
results reflected in the homes of in
dependent planters, constituting but
the flower of our civilization.
But, in the meanwhile, the boys
are leaving the farms. Why? that
is the question that L.. H. Bailey,
Director of the College OF Agricul-
ture Of Cornell University, asks in
the July Century magazine, and does
not definitely answer. He tries to
get the deserters from the ranks
of the farm to answer it, but their
reasons are not at all satisfactory.
For instance, forty per cent. of them
say that they left the farm because
it was not remunerative. Seventeen
per cent. replied that they left be-
cause the farmer is under "distinct
social disabilities" One-fifth, or
twenty per cent. offered as one rea-
son for getting away from the farm
the excessive hard work.
The investigator seems a little
surprised by the result of his efforts.
He concludes his article by saying:
Il have no purpose at present to