These reflections are introduced in no unfriendly spirit, and with serious intent. To me this new rural life is associated with memories of characteristically American hospitality; but my interest in it is more than personal. It is giving to those who cultivate it, among whom are the helpers most needed at the moment, a point of view which will enable them to grasp the real problem of the open country, as it exists, for example, in the great food-producing and cotton-growing tracts of the West and South. Both in the countries where the townward tendency of the industrial age was foreseen and prevented, and in those in which the evil is being cured, the impulse and inspiration which will be required to initiate and sustain our Country Life movement came mainly from leaders who were not themselves agriculturists.[10] Proficiency in the practice or even in the business of farming is not necessary. What is needed is a comprehensive knowledge of public affairs, political imagination, an understanding sympathy with and a philosophic insight into the entire life of communities. Men who combine with the necessary experience those gifts of heart and mind which go to make the higher citizenship in the many, and the statesmanship in the few, will more likely be found in the city than in the country. Yet they are, in the conditions, the natural leaders of the Country Life movement, which must now be defined.
The situation demands two things; on the one hand an association, popular, propagandist, organising; on the other, an Institute, scientific, philosophic, research-making. These two things are distinct in character, but they are complementary to each other. One will require popular enthusiasm and business organisation. To the service of the other must be brought the patient spirit of scientific and philosophic analysis and inquiry. These two bodies--the popular propagandist association and the scientific research-making Institute--must, therefore, be created; and, for a reason to be explained when we consider the work of the Institute, they should be independent of each other. This rough indication of the character of the work, which I will describe more in detail presently, will suffice for the moment. I feel that the work will be so intensely human in its interest that it will be well to say at once how the two central agencies can be established, and the movement made, not a writer's fancy, but a living and doing agency of human progress.