Document · book

The functions of a city : an oration before the city authorities of Boston, on the Fourth of July, 1868

Eliot, Samuel, 1821-1898, 1868. A public-domain text about Boston, accessioned whole so the archive can quote it.

Document

Type

book

Author

Eliot, Samuel, 1821-1898

Publisher

Boston : A. Mudge & Son

Published, as stated

1868

Language

en

Media type

text/plain; charset=utf-8

Size

41202 bytes

Preservation

preserved

Digest (SHA-256)

0e4e4ed63577c0541ba03ee57a8336b05722b570cc7513b71f210671ffe7b758

Text

Extracted text, as held. Quoted without alteration.

F 73 .37 .E42 Copy 1 \ THE FUNCTIONS OF A (JITY. AN ORATION BEFORE THE CIIY AUTHORITIES OF BOSTON, FOURTH OF JULY, 18(38. BY ^ samiteiXeliot. ll.d. BOSTON: ALFRED MUDGE & SOX, CITY PRINTERS, 34 SCHOOL STREET. 1868. THE FUNCTIONS OF A CITY. AN ORATION BEFORE THE CITY AUTHORITIES OF BOSTON, FOURTH OF JULY, 186 8. BY SAMUEL ELIOT, LL.D. / BOSTON: ALFRED MUDGE & SOX, CITY PRINTERS, 3i SCHOOL STREET. 1868. / k^ ORATION. BOSTON, OLD A>^D NEW. The Boston that hailed the early birthdays of the nation has almost passed away. A few of its historic buildings keep their, places, but with changed aspects and generally changed associations. Thi-ee or four of its churches remain, but in localities so altered as to alter them, and even to forebode their removal. Its mansions have completely vanished. Their stately fronts, their fair proportions of height and breadth, their wide halls, easy stau's, massive wainscots and graceful alcoves, the trees before them, the vines climb- ing their porches, the flowers blooming beneath their windows, the terraces and gardens surrounding them, linger only in remembrance. Remembrance itself but faintly recalls the streets like those of present villages, the open spaces then styled greens, the pastures where cattle browsed, the fields unoccupied except in the playtime of children, the shores that met the water 'with lips it did not shrink from kissing. The very 1* b JULY 4, 18G8. hills which gave the place its first name, instead of having proved everlasting, have sunk beneath the spade, their loftiness brought literally to the dust. Even the sea washing our peninsula, no more " Unchangeable save to its wild waves' play," finds its azure brow wrinkled with walls and marked by lines of building where fluttered, years ago, a gar- land of snowy sails. Another Boston has arisen on the old foundations and the new. Once a single neighborhood, it is now a group of neighborhoods ; once a society of personal acquaintances, now a population of indistinct connec- tions, where men cannot inquire into one another's aff"airs with the same success as of yore ; a scene for- merly of limited, latterly of expanded action, of customs shaped according to a broader rule, of enterprises laid out upon a larger scale, of relations more complex, systems more varied, standards more aspiring ; no longer a town but a city, with all the present, all the future prospects of which a city is the centre. Imag- ine a citizen of the Kevolution, or of the War of 1812, returning hither to find his birthplace buried beneath a warehouse, his church swallowed up in an abyss of traffic, an avenue where he skated, and a long vista of reef-stone facades where he bathed. Follow him on ORATION. 1 the round of our institutions, especially those where foreign tongues prevail over the native, and pieces of the Old World appear to have fallen on the New. He might find cause to think Boston as unlike its former self as some of its statues to their originals. Then hear him warned, as we are, that the city is declining, and that unless its capitalists provide it with half a dozen new railroads to the interior, and its harbor commissioners give it a new channel to the sea, its doom is sealed. Ah, he might exclaim, it needs the opening of a vein or two to reduce its symptoms o

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Identity

Identifier

urn:lemay:boston:document:the-functions-of-a-city-an-oration-before-the-city-authorities-of-boston-on-the-fourth-of-july-1868

Canonical URL

https://boston.fyi/document/the-functions-of-a-city-an-oration-before-the-city-authorities-of-boston-on-the-fourth-of-july-1868

As JSON

https://boston.fyi/document/the-functions-of-a-city-an-oration-before-the-city-authorities-of-boston-on-the-fourth-of-july-1868.json

Version

1 · last changed 5 September 2026