outburst of ecstasy and delight, the new-born possibility of loveliness and harmony and joyous existence, they not only exalted life with art, but gained the courage to undertake sterner examinations of its mystery. And this same perennial spirit of humanism built, not only the proud and voluptuous cities of Tuscany and Lombardy, but the wealthy free cities of Flanders and Germany--and it discovered America, not the America of the senses alone, but the larger, nobler America of the mind. And, surely, this America is not always to bear the reproach of having no music, and so little painting and literature of her own. Surely the aspirations of this new land, with the irresistible impulse of the democratic spirit and humanistic culture are to find emotional expression in the terms and forms of enduring beauty. It was this sublime adventure that interested me far more than the trivial and repulsive wrangles of the politicians.... Our opponents had never known how wholly right they were in their reiterated charge that I was but a dreamer; incorrigible dreamer indeed, and nothing more! But in these years I had given my city the best there was in me, little as that was, and when the legislature made provision for the constitutional convention, which met at Columbus, and, after months of deliberation, submitted a long list of amendments to the fundamental law of the state, among them that one which granted home rule to cities, I felt, for it was an emotion deeper than thought, that if the people could only be induced to approve that amendment the long anticipated and happy release was at hand. We had been engaged on an impossible task; we had been trying to regenerate the city by means of electing to office persons who in themselves would reflect the communal aspiration, but this could not be continued indefinitely; the cities could achieve no genuine reform until they were autonomous. With home rule democracy would have the means of development, and the people the opportunity of self-expression; they would have to depend on themselves; they could no longer, with an Oriental fatalism, neglect their own destiny and then lay the blame for the inevitable catastrophe on the mayor, or the political boss, or the country members of the legislature. There were, if I remember well, about fifty of these amendments, among them provisions for the initiative and referendum, woman suffrage, and many other progressive and radical doctrines, in addition to our beloved home rule for cities, and, when the campaign opened in behalf of their adoption, Newton Baker, who a year before had been elected mayor of Cleveland, proposed that he and I make a tour of the state in a motor car and speak for the home rule amendment, since all the others had their devoted proponents.