it is one of unquestionable importance; and there are none too many instigating forces to arouse man from inertia and idleness. At the highest degree of the scale, some men—we will not say all—impose additional work and mental tension upon themselves in order to have an elegant house, fine gardens, and high style; in the middle of the scale, other men will put themselves to additional trouble in order to procure some comfort which was only recently a luxury, and can still hardly be distinguished from one, or in order to reach a certain standard of respectability in their manner of living, to which decorations and superfluities will contribute. At the bottom of the scale numerous men and women work longer or tax their ingenuity in order to procure for themselves some secondary elegances which have become common but are nevertheless luxuries, in that the abundance of them does not contribute to the satisfaction of man's rudimentary wants.
The influence of luxury is very great upon social progress and the arts, and upon the course of literary and scientific advance. Industrial advancement is usually brought about by the efforts of individuals of remarkable will and intelligence, but sensitive to the attractions of material rewards. The surest of such rewards for the numerous spirits not solely devoted to an ideal is wealth, and this to many men would lose its value if they were deprived of the luxuries which they could obtain with it. While there are many men of noble aspirations among great inventors and the projectors of important enterprises who would be satisfied with the good they accomplished, there are others, energetic, capable, and ardent, and valuable in economic progress, who are guided by less noble ideas, and who, in themselves or their surroundings, have keener perceptions of the attractions of luxury than of pure intellectual enjoyments and the satisfaction of an elevated self-respect. It is important for mankind as a whole that such men do all they can for it.—Translated for The Popular Science Monthly from the Revue des Deux Mondes.
