possible. Any man who has gone to Edinburgh and seen the restoration of
the old life that has been carried out there under his hand knows it can
be done. I suppose we all came here to hear Professor Geddes speak on
practical affairs because his name is now connected with the plans for
making a city that shall be really expressive of all its potentialities
to all of its people. I am personally profoundly grateful to him for his
paper; and I move you that he be given a very hearty vote of thanks.

The Chairman. (MR. CHARLES BOOTH), in closing the discussion, said: I
myself entirely agree with what Mr Robertson has said as to the extreme
difficulty of bringing investigations of the kind referred to, to
practical conclusions--practical points. Practical work at present needs
the most attention. I perhaps am too old to do it, but I feel the
attraction of that kind of work, and that was one reason I was sorry Mr
Loch had to leave before we could hear what he might have to say. The
description I have given of London does seem to be a foggy labyrinth I
agree, but nevertheless I cannot but think that we do require a complete
conception if we are to do the definite work of putting different people
in their proper places in an organic whole, such as a city is. I do not
think we can do without it, and I regard the paper of this evening as an
important contribution [Page: 128] to that complete conception which I
feel we need. I should like each worker and thinker to have and to know
his place in the scheme of civic improvement; and I think it perfectly
possible for every man to know what it is that he is trying to do, what
contribution it is that he ought to give to that joint life which is
called here civics, which is the life of a city and the life in the
city. One man cannot possibly concentrate it all in himself. Within a
society such as the Sociological Society a general scheme is possible in
which each individual and each society shall play its acknowledged and
recognised part. It does not follow that the work done in one city can
apply as an example to another. Individuality has too strong a hold;
but each town may work out something for itself. I have been very much
interested in the work which Mr. Rowntree has done in York, on which he
was kind enough to consult me. He entered upon it on quite other grounds
from mine, but so far as the ground was common between him and me we
tried to have a common basis. Those of you who hav