University Lectures, Vol. 2

Excerpt from University Lectures, Vol. 2: Delivered by Members of the Faculty in the Free Public Lecture Course, 1914-1915 There is a very widespread popular belief that civilization means not merely the improvement in methods of life in an increase in the material bases of comfort, but also the gradual reduction of the problems of misery, crime and vice. So general is this belief that if those present today were to be asked, Would you prefer to live where crime, vice, poverty are unknown, where taxes are low, or where taxes are high and vice and misery common? Most would choose the former. Yet, if we were to make that decision and seek for the place where you might live under such conditions, you would discover that it involved the leaving of Philadelphia and our own beloved state and country to lead the life of a hermit in Some Utopia, or share the meager joys of some primitive people. It is my purpose this afternoon to Show you as best I can that our problems grow larger, not smaller, as civilization advances; that progress, in other words, involves difficulties. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.