of the true suburbs which grow round our great
industrial towns that they grow, as it were, unconsciously and blindly,
like grass that covers up a boundary line traced on the earth.
This indefinite expansion is controlled neither by the soul of the city
from within, nor by the resistance of the lands round about. It destroys
at once the dignity of a town and the freedom of a countryside.
The citizens are too new and numerous for citizenship; yet they
never learn what there is to be learned of the ancient traditions
of agriculture. The first sight of the sharp outline of Jerusalem
is like a memory of the older types of limitation and liberty.
Happy is the city that has a wall; and happier still if it
is a precipice.

Again, Jerusalem might be called a city of staircases.
Many streets are steep and most actually cut into steps.
It is, I believe, an element in the controversy about the cave
at Bethlehem traditionally connected with the Nativity
that the sceptics doubt whether any beasts of burden could
have entered a stable that has to be reached by such steps.
And indeed to any one in a modern city like London or Liverpool
it may well appear odd, like a cab-horse climbing a ladder.
But as a matter of fact, if the asses and goats of Jerusalem
could not go up and downstairs, they could not go anywhere.
However this may be, I mention the matter here merely as adding another
touch to that angular profile which is the impression involved here.
Strangely enough, there is something that leads up to this impression
even in the labyrinth of mountains through which the road winds
its way to the city. The hills round Jerusalem are themselves
often hewn out in terraces, like a huge stairway. This is mostly
for the practical and indeed profitable purpose of vineyards;
and serves for a reminder that this ancient seat of civilisation
has not lost the tradition of the mercy and the glory of the vine.
But in outline such a mountain looks much like the mountain
of Purgatory that Dante saw in his vision, lifted in terraces,
like titanic steps up to God. And indeed this shape also is symbolic;
as symbolic as the pointed profile of the Holy City.
For a creed is like a ladder, while an evolution is only like a slope.
A spiritual and social evolution is generally a pretty slippery slope;
a miry slope where it is very easy to slide down again.

Such is something like the sharp and even abrupt impression produced
by this mountain city; a