Page:Pacific Monthly volumes 9 and 10.djvu/762



T is coming to be recognized with more and more practical results that the laws which apply to the success of the individual are equally applicable to the management of great business enterprises, municipalities and national governments. Cities, nations, corporations are simply collections of men for some distinct purpose, and, as with individuals, the more definite the purpose, the more certainty of accomplishment. It is just as essential that a city and a nation should stand for something as it is for the individual.

Unity of purpose has always been regarded as of the greatest value to the individual, and it produces an irresistible force when it characterizes a municipality. The power of a large body of men bent upon one distinct aim is incalculably great.

The history of Seattle furnishes, perhaps, as good an example of this as can be found anywhere. Without disparagement to the other leading cities of the Coast, it can and should be said that Seattle possesses an "esprit de corps," a unity of purpose that is remarkable, and any attempt to belittle this spirit, whether it emanate from San Francisco, Portland, Tacoma, or Spokane, is a mistake. The attitude of the Pacific Monthly is not one of localism or favoritism. Representing the entire Pacific Coast, it is our province, we believe, to point out those things that pertain to the growth and progress of this great section. That Seattle furnishes along these lines a conspicuous object-lesson to the other cities on this Coast is undeniably true. Not that San Francisco, Portland, Tacoma and Vancouver, B. C, and other leading cities of the Coast do not, in a greater or lesser degree, possess this spirit. Undoubtedly they do. But they either fail to realize fully the benefits to be derived from unity of purpose, or else, as a rule, they lack the accomplishment.

It is not an easy thing to train a great body of men to think and act alike. The unique in Seattle's history is that a heterogeneous mass, coming from all parts of the world, and seemingly impossible to amalgamate, have been welded into a unified city, as one man regarding all things that pertain to its development. The spirit of enterprise, the spirit that does things, the strenuous lite of the individual applied to a municipality — these are what characterize Seattle today, and it is these things that are largely instrumental in the building up of great cities. Of course, back of all this, in California, in Oregon, in Washington, in British Columbia, are natur.al resources and splendid harbors that in themselves would inevitably be the means of creating great cities. But when to these natural advantages there is added a unified, indomitable spirit of enterprise and progress, the result is much quicker and absolutely sure.

There can be no doubt that the Pacific Coast will have, in the distant future, some of the greatest cities of the world, and that city will be the greatest, in numbers at least, which recognizes its opportunities and applies the universal laws of growth and progress.