lls,
arousing the citizens from sleep to view the destruction of their
city. So rational and interesting has daily life become, that mind
and body are constantly in healthy occupation; the fearful nervous
hurry of old times, that broke down so many minds and bodies,
having died out, to give way to a robust force of character which
accomplishes much more with half the fuss. Of course, advantages
such as these, did not spring upon society all at once; they have
come about by comparatively slow degrees.

The first president of the Society of Benefactors, who died some
years ago at an advanced age, was the man who started the new order
of things. When he commenced to give the world the benefit of his
views, he met with a good deal of opposition and ridicule, being
told that the world was going on all right and was improving all
the time, and that if people would only stop preaching and set to
work at doing a little more, things would get better more quickly.
He could not be convinced, however, that society had any grounds
for its satisfaction, but he took the hint about preaching and
stopped his lectures, which he had been giving all through the
country. He then set to work at organization, and as he had
inherited ample means from a millionaire father, he commenced
under good auspices. He went into his work with great eagerness,
gathering together all sorts of people, who held views similar to
his own, though usually in a vague unpractical way, and formed
his first committee of a bishop, celebrated for his enlightened
opinions, two physicians, two lawyers, several wealthy merchants,
and several working men who were good speakers and had influence
among their fellows. His capacity for organization was great,
and his success in gaining over to his side young men of means,
remarkable. From the very beginning the committee never lacked
money. Though they were actuated by purely philanthropic motives,
it was one of their first principles never to sink large sums
of money in any undertaking that would not pay its own expenses
ultimately. There was, therefore, a healthy business-like tone
about whatever they did, that distinguished their efforts from many
well-intentioned, but sickly, undertakings of the same day, which
one after another came to grief, doing nearly as much harm as good.
One of their first works was to buy up lots and dwellings in the
worst districts of Toronto, where miserable shanties and hovels
stood in fetid