THE

HE PEOPLES' Institute of New York was organized in 1897 by a group of men and women representing all sections of society. The purpose of its foundation was to provide a platform where the important questions of the day could be discussed in entire freedom, and where, if possible, the means could be provided for stimulating a better mutual understanding between differing sections and thus promoting peaceful social evolution. It was felt at the time that unless some such method were followed, the growing distrust and separation between classes might result in harmful collision. Certain principles were accepted at the outset as fundamental, and there have furnished the body of principles by which all the various lines of work have been directed. The founders of The Institute, looking abroad upon the existing social unrest, and considering the various methods that were proposed for the correction of the evils perceived that within all these various schemes the essential thought was to realize a new order of society in which the interdependence of its various members should be recognized. In other words, that all schools of social thought had in view the incorporation in a new social order of the principle of human brotherhood. It was also perceived that beneath all the various social and religious creeds there was a common ground of affirmation. In sum, the three principles which have guided the entire development of The Peoples' Institute are formulated in the opening articles of the Constitution of one of its branches. They are as follows:

Every phase of The Institutes' development has been simply a new formulation of this triune creed. The work falls to-day into the following departments.

I. A Peoples' Church. On every Sunday evening from November until May there gathers in the large hall of the Cooper Union, seating 1600, an audience that during the winter months over-fills the large hall, some 50 to 200 persons usually standing, and in the warmer months fills months fills or nearly fills it. This audience is composed 95 per cent. of men, chiefly wage-earners, and assembles from all parts of the greater city and from the suburbs. All speakers who have addressed it unite in declaring it to be the most intelligent and interesting body of hearers they have ever faced. The speakers are usually clergymen, representing all creeds, save the Catholic, which has not as yet accepted our invitation. Prominent laymen, especially college presidents, also take part. The subjects of the addresses are ethical or broadly religious, but creedal affirmation is expected to be absent. The services consist of an address, with music, followed by question and discussion, the

clergymen and rabbis have pronounced this work the most interesting religious work now carried on in New York city, and one that is exercising a very great influence, especially upon the young men of the East Side. An important extension of this work, looking toward a closer relation and better understanding between the churches and the masses of the people, is now under considera

tion.

II. A School of Training for American Citizenship. For three evenings a week. during the same period, November to May, addresses on live topics of the day, also on various departments of history and social science, are given in the large hall of the Cooper Union to audiences ranging from 600 to the capacity of the hall and above. The subjects chosen are chiefly those which most vitally engage present attention, the purpose being to qualify the hearers for sane, intelligent thought and action upon live questions. The audience, as before, is gathered from a wide area. Beside the work done in the large hall of the Cooper Union extension courses of a similar character are offered in various centers. The lecturers in both cases are selected, but especially those for the large hall, from the men most eminent in the special fields of study considered. Question and discussion, as in the case of the ethical address, are allowed with entire freedom. Beside the above work in social education, courses for first voters are given in various parts of the city.

III. Forum Work. The social-educational work of The Institute developed in its second year into active participation in public, especially legislative questions. During the entire season the office of The Institute is kept in close touch with all legislative measures proposed in Albany; with measures similarly affecting the interests of the people advocated before the Board of Aldermen or through civic bodies; also, though in a less degree, with what is going on in Washington. All proposed legislation in

the interest of the people is approved and supported, sometimes with, sometimes without a mass meeting; all that is opposed to the people's interest attacked in similar fashion. The influence of this department of The Institute's work, which has come to be universally accepted as the tribunate of the masses of the people of New York city, has been of far-reaching effect. Grab legislation has been repeatedly defeated by the united protests of the people gathered under the auspices of the Peoples' Institute, and similarly worthy measures assisted in their enactment into law. In outlying towns, in imitation of The Institute's work in this field, various Peoples' Forums have in recent years been established.

IV. The Theater. A body of some fifty eminent citizens representing the public-school system, organized labor, the clergy, settlements, department stores, literature, music, art, etc., has charge of this work. The control is vested in the hands of a sub-committee of 20, similarly representative. Arrangements are made with the leading theaters for the offering of plays that have been carefully examined before acceptance for those whom our work reaches. Although the department was only finally organized six months ago, the number of institutions now upon our list passes 1,100; the number of individuals reached a million. Additions to the list are being made constantly, the last being that of the Bell Telephone Company with 5,000 young women employés. Suburban towns are asking and receiving from us similar privileges. The whole is so carefully ordered that the danger of the reducedprice tickets falling into hands that should not receive them is obviated.

V. Music. On the musical side The Institute coöperates with a sister organization which came into being through its support, namely, The People's Symphony Concert Association. Thereby symphony and chamber music concerts are provided at nominal prices. More re

cently The Institute has established a Music Committee composed of experts. This committee plans during the ensuing year to secure from musical organizations facilities similar to those which the Dramatic Committee has secured from the theaters.

VI. Social Clubs. The problem of providing social homes for those of limited means was early undertaken by The Institute. Its solution was one of the most difficult tasks attempted. At present The Institute owns a club-house charmingly situated at 318 East 15th street, facing Stuyvesant Square. Two and a half floors of the club-house are occupied every evening by The Institute's social Club A. It has a membership of 350, one-third women, and carries on a varied and helpful educational and social work. It furnishes a happy home for its membership, drawn almost entirely from the East Side. Being composed of both sexes, marriages between the members are not infrequent. not infrequent. Recently a large dramatic and operatic section has been formed. This group gave lately two Italian operas, "I Pagliacci" and "La Cavalleria Rusticana," in a manner that was considered quite remarkable for amateurs. A similar group to the one meeting on East 15th street has within a year been organized in Brooklyn and is growing rapidly. It numbers some seventy-five members.

now

VII. Civic Clubs. The Institute is establishing with some rapidity clubs for young men for the purpose of interesting them and engaging them actively in civic betterment. Lectures upon civics, discussions of civic problems, investigation of civic conditions and energetic effort for their betterment characterize all these clubs. The membership is limited, ranging usually from 15 to 25. Some of them have done important work.

VIII. Children's Clubs. During the daytime a number of children's clubs of boys and girls gather for the study of city history and simple civics in the club rooms. The number of these clubs is

limited only by the number of volunteer workers. Each club member is made to feel herself or himself a part of The Institute's great family of brothers and sisters, and is thus trained from the start in love for American ideals and consecration to work for others. Beside the above clubs a club of young women meets at regular intervals in the club-house for social and educational purposes.

IX. Beside the clubs, a group of the active members of The Peoples' Institute audience has been formed called The Peoples' Institute League. Its work distinguishes itself from that of the clubs in having a more general character. Each civic club is made responsible for the civic conditions in its section of the city. The League is assumed to have a general outlook upon the entire field. Although only established a year, it has already done important work.

X. The various groups of The Institute are federated through delegates in a Civic Council, thus enabling each group to inform itself as to what the others are doing and all to render mutual assistance.

XI. During the season The Institute publishes a small weekly paper with leading articles upon living questions, and reports upon the activities of the various branches of The Institute.

XII. The most recent development of The Institute is in the direction of organizing various agencies that have to do with the protection of life and property afloat. Under the auspices of The Institute there is now being organized The People's Institute Marine League, composed of groups of pilots, engineers, etc., numbering some 38,000. These separate groups have exact knowledge with regard to the conditions of our steamers and other vessels, but hitherto have not had the medium through which such knowledge could be made public and effective for the reform of existing conditions. There was danger to the individual of losing his position in case publicity were attempted. Already through conferences held prior to the

organization, important work has been done, and it is believed that this department of The Institute will prove of equal value with the other.

In sum, it may be said of The Institute that its field of action is as varied as the interests of that section of the people which frequents its halls. It might affirm with a slight variation of the old

Latin dictum, "Nothing that concerns the interests of the people is foreign to me." Thus its field of activity is likely to broaden ever, but this will be only a natural growth out of the confidence which the people repose in the sincerity and effectiveness of its effort.

CHARLES SPRAGUE SMITH.
New York City.

IN THE preface to Science and Health Mary Baker Eddy states that the first school of Christian Science Mindhealing was begun by the author in Lynn, Massachusetts, about the year 1867, with only one student.

Like Mahomet, she began with one disciple, and, like the religion of Islam, her teachings have spread with a rapidity mightily contrasting with the growth of Christianity prior to the conversion of Constantine. Numerical and financial prosperity marks the fortieth year of Christian Science. The Mother Church of Boston, with an enrolled membership of over forty-one thousand, has erected, at a cost of two million dollars, a temple worthy of any cathedral town of Europe. Christian Science has lived serenely through the period of crass and ignorant criticism, and when from misapprehension, men of note and attainment have written and spoken adversely, it has remained untroubled, knowing that error is its own refutation. That the uninitiated fail to grasp the meaning of Christian Science is no wonder when we consider its inception, a birth of idealism, a religiophilosophical system appearing amidst an unphilosophical people of materialistic tendencies. This failure to grasp is, indeed, no wonder for among those trained to reason in the realms of the

abstract, differences of opinion arise in regard to the meaning of beliefs held in common; thus Nirvana is to some Indian thinkers but absorption, annihilation of self in the Divine Essence; to others it is unlimited enlarging of Individuality; therefore Buddha, in the moment of enlightenment, exclaimed, "The Universe grows I!"

To the student of philosophies, especially those belonging to the idealistic succession from Plato to the Neo-Platonists, and from Descartes to Spinoza and Berkeley, and from these to Schopenhauer, the reviver of Indian metaphysics, much in Science and Health has a familiar look. Philosophy, since its origin among the Ionian Greeks, and the authors of the Upanashads, has covered pretty much the whole sphere of speculative thought; hence the present impossibility of devising a system not encroaching upon the domain of another.

Before the days of Socrates, the Eleatics, postulating one pure and unconditioned Being, regarded the phenomenal world as nullity. Two hundred and fifty years ago, Spinoza, holding to the conception of a single, self-sustaining Substance, comprehending all Reality, called it God, and also Infinite, but feared further to define, deeming that definition materializes and minimizes