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51
tralising unity, not a monotonous unity. Although we may
believe that London should be one, we believe that unity will be
best attained and strengthened by maintaining local spirit, by
encouraging local spirit, and by developing local spirit. (Cheers.)
We desire to see London united, but not London a unit. We
desire that the powers that are best not discharged through local
bodies should, indeed, be discharged by a central body; but our
view of that central body is that it should be a tree under whose
shadow local development may be free and fostered—not a tree
under whose shadow development may be stunted or killed.
(Cheers.) What is it, indeed, we all desire for London ? The
facts, though simple, are simple enough. We have here the
greatest aggregate of human beings that has ever existed in the
history of the world in the same area of space. There is no
sign or possibility of that aggregate diminishing; every sign,
indeed, points to an increase. The greater bodies appear to
attract the lesser bodies, as may be found in other sciences, and,
as a matter of fact, what we daily see is, not in any degree the
diminution of the population of London, or the fear of it becoming
stunted, but rather the apprehension that it may suck and
attract to itself that population outside which ought to live on
the rural land of the country. We have, then, to contemplate
—and I think we must contemplate it with some dismay, unless
we take remedies to meet it—the daily and hourly increase of
this vast population, and what we have to take care of is that
this which is already unwieldy should not become absolutely
hopeless as an aggregate.
I say, then, that unless we constantly and vigilantly watch
this problem of the growth of London, the problem will outstrip
us, and we shall find ourselves landed in chaos ; and what I think
the statesmen who have to deal with this problem have to look
to first, is this—the formation of a central body, which shall be
responsible for the common interests of the whole of London.
That it may be equal to so vast a task as the superintendence of the
common interest of the whole of London, we must take care that
this body is not overburdened with detail, and that all the detail
which may best be attended to in the districts themselves may
be relegated to or maintained in those districts. In that way
London, as it appears to me, may extend almost indefinitely,
both peacefully and usefully; but I venture to think there are
two alternative courses in which there is neither peace nor
safety. One is the maintenance within the metropolitan area of
two Londons, by which you maintain and stereotype a sort of
municipal civil war ; and the other would be if any statesman
should be so mad or so reckless as to attempt to destroy the local
life of the London districts, and to suck all their attributes and
all their powers into one great overgrown municipal Parliament.
D