n reach of
your influence to be always neat and clean, and giving them means of being
so. In so far as they absolutely refuse, you must give up the effort with
respect to them, only taking care that no children within your sphere of
influence shall any more be brought up with such habits; and that every
person who is willing to dress with propriety shall have encouragement to
do so. And the first absolutely necessary step toward this is the gradual
adoption of a consistent dress for different ranks of persons, so that
their rank shall be known by their dress; and the restriction of the
changes of fashion within certain limits. All which appears for the
present quite impossible; but it is only so far even difficult as it is
difficult to conquer our vanity, frivolity, and desire to appear what we
are not. And it is not, nor ever shall be, creed of mine, that these mean
and shallow vices are unconquerable by Christian women.

And then, thirdly, lodging people, which you may think should have been
put first, but I put it third, because we must feed and clothe people
where we find them, and lodge them afterwards. And providing lodgment for
them means a great deal of vigorous legislation, and cutting down of
vested interests that stand in the way; and after that, or before that, so
far as we can get it, through sanitary and remedial action in the houses
that we have; and then the building of more, strongly, beautifully, and in
groups of limited extent, kept in proportion to their streams, and walled
round, so that there may be no festering and wretched suburb anywhere, but
clean and busy streets within, and the open country without, with a belt
of beautiful garden and orchard round the walls, so that from any part of
the city perfectly fresh air and grass, and sight of far horizon, might be
reachable in a few minutes' walk. This the final aim; but in immediate
action every minor and possible good to be instantly done, when, and as,
we can; roofs mended that have holes in them--fences patched that have
gaps in them--walls buttressed that totter--and floors propped that shake;
cleanliness and order enforced with our own hands and eyes, till we are
breathless, every day. And all the fine arts will healthily follow. I
myself have washed a flight of stone stairs all down, with bucket and
broom, in a Savoy inn, where they hadn't washed their stairs since they
first went up them; and I never made a better sketch than that afternoon.