small share of its beauty, and its wonder, and its rest, for their
own health of soul and body, and for the health of their children
after them.



GREAT CITIES AND THEIR INFLUENCE FOR GOOD AND EVIL {9}



The pleasure, gentlemen and ladies, of addressing you here is
mixed in my mind with very solemn feelings; the honour which you
have done me is tempered by humiliating thoughts.

For it was in this very city of Bristol, twenty-seven years ago,
that I received my first lesson in what is now called Social
Science; and yet, alas! more than ten years elapsed ere I could
even spell out that lesson, though it had been written for me (as
well as for all England) in letters of flame, from the one end of
heaven to the other.

I was a school-boy in Clifton up above. I had been hearing of
political disturbances, even of riots, of which I understood
nothing, and for which I cared nothing. But on one memorable
Sunday afternoon I saw an object which was distinctly not
political. Otherwise I should have no right to speak of it here.

It was an afternoon of sullen autumn rain. The fog hung thick
over the docks and lowlands. Glaring through that fog I saw a
bright mass of flame--almost like a half-risen sun.