Conspicuous Leisure: Status and Servants

[The] term 'leisure', as here used, does not connote indolence or quiescence. What it connotes is nonproductive consumption of time. Time is consumed non-productively (1) from a sense of the unworthiness of productive work, and (2) as an evidence of pecuniary ability to afford a life of idleness. But the whole of the life of the gentleman of leisure is not spent before the eyes of the spectators who are to be impressed with that spectacle of honorific leisure which in the ideal scheme makes up his life. For some part of the time his life is perforce withdrawn from the public eye, and of this portion which is spent in private the gentleman of leisure should, for the sake of his good name, be able to give a convincing account. He should find some means of putting in evidence the leisure that is not spent in the sight of the spectators. This can be done only indirectly, through the exhibition of some tangible, lasting results of the leisure so spent-in a manner analogous to the familiar exhibition of tangible, lasting products of the labour performed for the gentleman of leisure by handicraftsmen and servants in his employ.

The lasting evidence of productive labour is its material product-commonly some article of consumption. In the case of exploit it is similarly possible and usual to procure some tangible result that may serve for exhibition in the way of trophy or booty. At a later phase of the development it is customary to assume some badge or insignia of honour that will serve as a conventionally accepted mark of exploit, and which at the same time indicates the quantity or degree of exploit of which it is the symbol. As the population increases in density, and as human relations grow more complex and numerous, all the details of life undergo a process of elaboration and selection; and in this process of elaboration the use of trophies develops into a system of rank, titles, degrees and insignia, typical examples of which are heraldic devices, medals, and honorary decorations.

As seen from the economic point of view, leisure, considered as an employment, is closely allied in kind with the life of exploit; and the achievements which characterise a life of leisure, and which remain as its decorous criteria, have much in common with the trophies of exploit. But leisure in the narrower sense, as distinct from exploit and from any ostensibly productive employment of effort on objects which are of no intrinsic use, does not commonly leave a material product. The criteria of a past performance of leisure therefore commonly take the form of 'immaterial' goods. Such immaterial evidences of past leisure are quasi-scholarly or quasi-artistic accomplishments and a knowledge of processes and incidents which do not conduce directly to the furtherance of human life. So, for instance, in our time there is the knowledge of the dead languages and the occult sciences; of correct spelling; of syntax and prosody; of the various forms of domestic music and other household art; of the latest proprieties of dress, furniture, and equipage; of games, sports, and fancybred animals, such as dogs and race-horses. In all these branches of knowledge the initial motive from which their acquisition proceeded at the outset, and through which they first came into vogue, may have been something quite different from the wish to show that one's time had not been spent in industrial employment; but unless these accomplishments had approved themselves as serviceable evidence of an unproductive expenditure of time, they would not have survived and held their place as conventional accomplishments of the leisure class.

These accomplishments may, in some sense, be classed as branches of learning. Beside and beyond these there is a further range of social facts which shade off from the region of learning into that of physical habit and dexterity. Such are what is known as manners and breeding, polite usage, decorum, and formal and ceremonial observances generally. This class of facts are even more immediately and obtrusively presented to the observation, and they are therefore more widely and more imperatively insisted on as required evidences of a reputable degree of leisure. It is worth while to remark that all that class of ceremonial observances which are classed under the general head of manners hold a more important place in the esteem of men during the stage of culture at which conspicuous leisure has the greatest vogue as a mark of reputability, than at later stages of the cultural development. The barbarian of the quasi- peaceable stage of industry is notoriously a more highbred gentleman, in all that concerns decorum, than any but the very exquisite among the men of a later age. Indeed, it is well known, or at least it is currently believed, that manners have progressively deteriorated as society has receded from the patriarchal stage. Many a gentleman of the old school has been provoked to remark regretfully upon the under-bred manners and beating of even the better classes in the modem industrial communities; and the decay of the ceremonial code-or as it is otherwise called, the vulgarisation of life-among the industrial classes proper has become one of the chief enormities of latter-day civilisation in the eyes of all persons of delicate sensibilities. The decay which the code has suffered at the hands of a busy people testifies-all deprecation apart-to the fact that decorum is a product and an exponent of leisure-class life and thrives in full measure only under a régime of status.

The origin, or better the derivation, of manners is, no doubt, to be sought elsewhere than in a conscious effort on the part of the well-mannered to show that much time has been spent in acquiring them. The proximate end of innovation and elaboration has been the higher effectiveness of the new departure in point of beauty or of expressiveness. In great part the ceremonial code of decorous usages owes its beginning and its growth to the desire to conciliate or to show goodwill, as anthropologists and sociologists are in the habit of assuming, and this initial motive is rarely if ever absent from the conduct of well-mannered persons at any stage of the later development. Manners, we are told, are in part an elaboration of gesture, and in part they are symbolical and conventionalised survivals representing former acts of dominance or of personal service or of personal contact. In large part they are an expression of the relation of status-a symbolic pantomime of mastery on the one hand and of subservience on the other. Wherever at the present time the predatory habit of mind, and the consequent attitude of mastery and of subservience, gives its character to the accredited scheme of life, there the importance of all punctilios of conduct is extreme, and the assiduity with which the ceremonial observance of rank and titles is attended to approaches closely to the ideal set by the barbarian of the quasi-peaceable nomadic culture. Some of the Continental countries afford good illustrations of this spiritual survival. In these communities the archaic ideal is similarly approached as regards the esteem accorded to manners as a fact of intrinsic worth.

Decorum set out with being symbol and pantomime and with having utility only as an exponent of the facts and qualities symbolised; but it presently suffered the transmutation which commonly passes over symbolical facts in human intercourse. Manners presently came, in popular apprehension, to be possessed of a substantial utility in themselves; they acquired a sacramental character, in great measure independent of the facts which they originally prefigured. Deviations from the code of decorum have become intrinsically odious to all men, and good breeding is, in everyday apprehension, not simply an adventitious mark of human excellence, but an integral feature of the worthy human soul. There are few things that so touch us with instinctive revulsion as a breach of decorum; and so far have we progressed in the direction of imputing intrinsic utility to the ceremonial observances of etiquette that few of us, if any, can dissociate an offence against etiquette from a sense of the substantial unworthiness of the offender. A breach of faith may be condoned, but a breach of decorum can not. 'Manners maketh man'.

None the less, while manners have this intrinsicutility, in the apprehension of the performer and the beholder alike, this sense of the intrinsic rightness of decorum is only the proximate ground of the vogue of manners and breeding. Their ulterior, economic ground is to be sought in the honorific character of that leisure or non-productive employment of time and effort without which good manners are not acquired. The knowledge and habit of good form come only by long-continued use. Refined tastes, manners, and habits of life are a useful evidence of gentility, because good breeding requires time, application, and expense, and can therefore not be compassed by those whose time and energy are taken up with work. A knowledge of good form is prima facie evidence that that portion of the well-bred person's life which is not spent under the observation of the spectator has been worthily spent in acquiring accomplishments that are of no lucrative effect. In the last analysis the value of manners lies in the fact that they are the voucher of a life of leisure. Therefore, conversely, since leisure is the conventional means of pecuniary repute, the acquisition of some proficiency in decorum is incumbent on all who aspire to a modicum of pecuniary decency.

So much of the honourable life of leisure as is not spent in the sight of spectators can serve the purposes of reputability only in so far as it leaves a tangible, visible result that can be put in evidence and can be measured and compared with products of the same class exhibited by competing aspirants for repute. Some such effect, in the way of leisurely manners and carriage, etc., follows from simple persistent abstention from work, even where the subject does not take thought of the matter and studiously acquire an air of leisurely opulence and mastery. Especially does it seem to be true that a life of leisure in this way persisted in through several generations will leave a persistent, ascertainable effect in the conformation of the person, and still more in his habitual bearing and demeanour. But all the suggestions of a cumulative life of leisure, and all the proficiency in decorum that comes by the way of passive habituation, may be further improved upon by taking thought and assiduously acquiring the marks of honourable leisure, and then carrying the exhibition of these adventitious marks of exemption from employment out in a strenuous and systematic discipline. Plainly, this is a point at which a diligent application of effort and expenditure may materially further the attainment of a decent proficiency in the leisure-class proprieties. Conversely, the greater the degree of proficiency and the more patent the evidence of a high degree of habituation to observances which serve no lucrative or other directly useful purpose, the greater the consumption of time and substance impliedly involved in their acquisition, and the greater the resultant good repute. Hence, under the competitive struggle for proficiency in good manners, it comes about that much pains is taken with the cultivation of habits of decorum; and hence the details of decorum develop into a comprehensive discipline, conformity to which is required of all who would be held blameless in point of repute. And hence, on the other hand, this conspicuous leisure of which decorum is a ramification grows gradually into a laborious drill in deportment and an education in taste and discrimination as to what articles of consumption are decorous and what are the decorous methods of consuming them.

In this connection it is worthy of notice that the possibility of producing pathological and other idiosyncrasies of person and manner by shrewd mimicry and a systematic drill have been turned to account in the deliberate production of a cultured class-often with a very happy effect. In this way, by the process vulgarly known as snobbery, a syncopated evolution of gentle birth and breeding is achieved in the case of a goodly number of families and lines of descent. This syncopated gentle birth gives results which, in point of serviceability as a leisure-class factor in the population, are in no wise substantially inferior to others who may have had a longer but less arduous training in the pecuniary proprieties.

There are, moreover, measureable degrees of conformity to the latest accredited code of the punctilios as regards decorous means and methods of consumption. Differences between one person and another in the degree of conformity to the ideal in these respects can be compared, and persons may be graded and scheduled with some accuracy and effect according to a progressive scale of manners and breeding. The award of reputability in this regard is commonly made in good faith, on the ground of conformity to accepted canons of taste in the matters concerned, and without conscious regard to the pecuniary standing or the degree of leisure practised by any given candidate for reputability; but the canons of taste according to which the award is made are constantly under the surveillance of the law of conspicuous leisure, and are indeed constantly undergoing change and revision to bring them into closer conformity with its requirements. So that while the proximate ground of discrimination may be of another kind, still the pervading principle and abiding test of good breeding is the requirement of a substantial and patent waste of time. There may be some considerable range of variation in detail within the scope of this principle, but they are variations of form and expression, not of substance.

Much of the courtesy of everyday intercourse is of course a direct expression of consideration and kindly good-will, and this element of conduct has for the most part no need of being traced back to any underlying ground of reputability to explain either its presence or the approval with which it is regarded; but the same is not true of the code of proprieties. These latter are expressions of status. It is of course sufficiently plain, to any one who cares to see, that our bearing towards menials and other pecuniarily dependent inferiors is the bearing of the superior member in a relation of status, though its manifestation is often greatly modified and softened from the original expression of crude dominance. Similarly, our bearing towards superiors, and in great measure towards equals, expresses a more or less conventionalised attitude of subservience. Witness the masterful presence of the high-minded gentleman or lady, which testifies to so much of dominance and independence of economic circumstances, and which at the same time appeals with such convincing force to our sense of what is right and gracious. It is among this highest leisure class, who have no superiors and few peers, that decorum finds its fullest and maturest expression; and it is this highest class also that gives decorum that definitive formulation which serves as a canon of conduct for the classes beneath. And here also the code is most obviously a code of status and shows most plainly its incompatibility with all vulgarly productive work. A divine assurance and an imperious complaisance, as of one habituated to require subservience and to take no thought for the morrow, is the birthright and the criterion of the gentleman at his best; and it is in popular apprehension even more than that, for this demeanour is accepted as an intrinsic attribute of superior worth, before which the base-born commoner delights to stoop and yield.



As has been indicated in an earlier chapter, there is reason to believe that the institution of ownership has begun with the ownership of persons, primarily women. The incentives to acquiring such property have apparently been: (1) a propensity for dominance and coercion; (2) the utility of these persons as evidence of the prowess of their owner; (3) the utility of their services.

Personal service holds a peculiar place in the economic development. During the stage of quasi-peaceable industry, and especially during the earlier development of industry within the limits of this general stage, the utility of their services seems commonly to be the dominant motive to the acquisition of property in persons. Servants are valued for their services. But the dominance of this motive is not due to a decline in the absolute importance of the other two utilities possessed by servants. It is rather that the altered circumstances of life accentuate the utility of servants for this last-named purpose. Women and other slaves are highly valued, both as an evidence of wealth and as a means of accumulating wealth. Together with cattle, if the tribe is a pastoral one, they are the usual form of investment for a profit. To such an extent may female slavery give its character to the economic life under the quasi-peaceable culture that the woman even comes to serve as a unit of value among peoples occupying this cultural stage-as for instance in Homeric times. Where this is the case there need be little question but that the basis of the industrial system is chattel slavery and that the women are commonly slaves. The great, pervading human relation in such a system is that of master and servant. The accepted evidence of wealth is the possession of many women, and presently also of other slaves engaged in attendance on their master's person and in producing goods for him.

A division of labour presently sets in, whereby personal service and attendance on the master becomes the special office of a portion of the servants, while those who are wholly employed in industrial occupations proper are removed more and more from all immediate relation to the person of their owner. At the same time those servants whose office is personal service, including domestic duties, come gradually to be exempted from productive industry carried on for gain.

This process of progressive exemption from the common run of industrial employment will commonly begin with the exemption of the wife, or the chief wife. After the community has advanced to settled habits of life, wife-capture from hostile tribes becomes impracticable as a customary source of supply. Where this cultural advance has been achieved, the chief wife is ordinarily of gentle blood, and the fact of her being so will hasten her exemption from vulgar employment. The manner in which the concept of gentle blood originates, as well as the place which it occupies in the development of marriage, cannot be discussed in this place. For the purpose in hand it will be sufficient to say that gentle blood is blood which has been ennobled by protracted contact with accumulated wealth or unbroken prerogative. The woman with these antecedents is preferred in marriage, both for the sake of a resulting alliance with her powerful relatives and because a superior worth is felt to inhere in blood which has been associated with many goods and great power. She will still be her husband's chattel, as she was her father's chattel before her purchase, but she is at the same time of her father's gentle blood; and hence there is a moral incongruity in her occupying herself with the debasing employments of her fellow-servants. However completely she may be subject to her master, and however inferior to the male members of the social stratum in which her birth has placed her, the principle that gentility is transmissible will act to place her above the common slave; and so soon as this principle has acquired a prescriptive authority it will act to invest her in some measure with that prerogative of leisure which is the chief mark of gentility. Furthered by this principle of transmissible gentility the wife's exemption gains in scope, if the wealth of her owner permits it, until it includes exemption from debasing menial service as well as from handicraft. As the industrial development goes on and property becomes massed in relatively fewer hands, the conventional standard of wealth of the upper class rises. The same tendency to exemption from handicraft, and in the course of time from menial domestic employments, will then assert itself as regards the other wives, if such there are, and also as regards other servants in immediate attendance upon the person of their master. The exemption comes more tardily the remoter the relation in which the servant stands to the person of the master.

If the pecuniary situation of the master permits it, the development of a special class of personal or body servants is also furthered by the very grave importance which comes to attach to this personal service. The master's person, being the embodiment of worth and honour, is of the most serious consequence. Both for his reputable standing in the community and for his selfrespect, it is a matter of moment that he should have at his call efficient specialised servants, whose attendance upon his person is not diverted from this their chief office by any by-occupation. These specialised servants are useful more for show than for service actually performed. In so far as they are not kept for exhibition simply, they afford gratification to their master chiefly in allowing scope to his propensity for dominance. It is true, the care of the continually increasing household apparatus may require added labour; but since the apparatus is commonly increased in order to serve as a means of good repute rather than as a means of comfort, this qualification is not of great weight. All these lines of utility are better served by a larger number of more highly specialised servants. There results, therefore, a constantly increasing differentiation and multiplication of domestic and body servants, along with a concomitant progressive exemption of such servants from productive labour. By virtue of their serving as evidence of ability to pay, the office of such domestics regularly tends to include continually fewer duties, and their service tends in the end to become nominal only. This is especially true of those servants who are in most immediate and obvious attendance upon their master. So that the utility of these comes to consist, in great part, in their conspicuous exemption from productive labour and in the evidence which this exemption affords of their master's wealth and power.

After some considerable advance has been made in the practice of employing a special corps of servants for the performance of a conspicuous leisure in this manner, men begin to be preferred above women for services that bring them obtrusively into view. Men, especially lusty, personable fellows, such as footmen and other menials should be, are obviously more powerful and more expensive than women. They are better fitted for this work, as showing a larger waste of time and of human energy. Hence it comes about that in the economy of the leisure class the busy housewife of the early patriarchal days, with her retinue of hard-working handmaidens, presently gives place to the lady and the lackey.

In all grades and walks of life, and at any stage of the economic development, the leisure of the lady and of the lackey differs from the leisure of the gentleman in his own right in that it is an occupation of an ostensibly laborious kind. It takes the form, in large measure, of a painstaking attention to the service of the master, or to the maintenance and elaboration of the household paraphernalia; so that it is leisure only in the sense that little or no productive work is performed by this class, not in the sense that all appearance of labour is avoided by them. The duties performed by the lady, or by the household or domestic servants, are frequently arduous enough, and they are also frequently directed to ends which are considered extremely necessary to the comfort of the entire household. So far as these services conduce to the physical efficiency or comfort of the master or the rest of the household, they are to be accounted productive work. Only the residue of employment left after deduction of this effective work is to be classed as a performance of leisure.

But much of the services classed as household cares in modem everyday life, and many of the 'utilities' required for a comfortable existence by civilised man, are of a ceremonial character. They are, therefore, properly to be classed as a performance of leisure in the sense in which the term is here used. They may be none the less imperatively necessary from the point of view of decent existence; they may be none the less requisite for personal comfort even, although they may be chiefly or wholly of a ceremonial character. But in so far as they partake of this character they are imperative and requisite because we have been taught to require them under pain of ceremonial uncleanness or unworthiness. We feel discomfort in their absence, but not because their absence results directly in physical discomfort; nor would a taste not trained to discriminate between the conventionally good and the conventionally bad take offence at their omission. In so far as this is true the labour spent in these services is to be classed as leisure; and when performed by others than the economically free and self-directing head of the establishment, they are to be classed as vicarious leisure.

The vicarious leisure performed by housewives and menials, under the head of household cares, may frequently develop into drudgery, especially where the competition for reputability is close and strenuous. This is frequently the case in modem life. Where this happens, the domestic service which comprises the duties of this servant class might aptly be designated as wasted effort, rather than as vicarious leisure. But the latter term has the advantage of indicating the line of derivation of these domestic offices, as well as of neatly suggesting the substantial economic ground of their utility; for these occupations are chiefly useful as a method of imputing pecuniary reputability to the master or to the household on the ground that a given amount of time and effort is conspicuously wasted in that behalf.

In this way, then, there arises a subsidiary or derivative leisure class, whose office is the performance of a vicarious leisure for the behoof of the reputability of the primary or legitimate leisure class. This vicarious leisure class is distinguished from the leisure class proper by a characteristic feature of its habitual mode of life. The leisure of the master class is, at least ostensibly, an indulgence of a proclivity for the avoidance of labour and is presumed to enhance the master's own well-being and fulness of life; but the leisure of the servant class exempt from productive labour is in some sort a performance exacted from them, and is not normally or primarily directed to their own comfort. The leisure of the servant is not his own leisure. So far as he is a servant in the full sense, and not at the same time a member of a lower order of the leisure class proper, his leisure normally passes under the guise of specialised service directed to the furtherance of his master's fulness of life. Evidence of this relation of subservience is obviously present in the servant's carriage and manner of life. The like is often true of the wife throughout the protracted economic stage during which she is still primarily a servant-that is to say, so long as the household with a male head remains in force. In order to satisfy the requirements of the leisure-class scheme of life, the servant should show not only an attitude of subservience, but also the effects of special training and practice in subservience. The servant or wife should not only perform certain offices and show a servile disposition, but it is quite as imperative that they should show an acquired facility in the tactics of subservience-a trained conformity to the canons of effectual and conspicuous subservience. Even to-day it is this aptitude and acquired skill in the formal manifestation of the servile relation that constitutes the chief element of utility in our highly paid servants, as well as one of the chief ornaments of the well-bred housewife.

The first requisite of a good servant is that he should conspicuously know his place. It is not enough that he knows how to effect certain desired mechanical results; he must, above all, know how to effect these results in due form. Domestic service might be said to be a spiritual rather than a mechanical function. Gradually there grows up an elaborate system of good form, specifically regulating the manner in which this vicarious leisure of the servant class is to be performed. Any departure from these canons of form is to be deprecated, not so much because it evinces a shortcoming in mechanical efficiency, or even that it shows an absence of the servile attitude and temperament, but because, in the last analysis, it shows the absence of special training. Special training in personal service costs time and effort, and where it is obviously present in a high degree, it argues that the servant who possesses it, neither is nor has been habitually engaged in any productive occupation. It is prima facie evidence of a vicarious leisure extending far back in the past. So that trained service has utility, not only as gratifying the master's instinctive liking for good and skilful workmanship and his propensity for conspicuous dominance over those whose lives are subservient to his own, but it has utility also as putting in evidence a much larger consumption of human service than would be shown by the mere present conspicuous leisure performed by an untrained person. It is a serious grievance if a gentleman's butler or footman performs his duties about his master's table or carriage in such unformed style as to suggest that his habitual occupation may be ploughing or sheepherding. Such bungling work would imply inability on the master's part to procure the service of specially trained servants; that is to say, it would imply inability to pay for the consumption of time, effort, and instruction required to fit a trained servant for special service under an exacting code of forms. If the performance of the servant argues lack of means on the part of his master, it defeats its chief substantial end; for the chief use of servants is the evidence they afford of the master's ability to pay.

What has just been said might be taken to imply that the offence of an under-trained servant lies in a direct suggestion of inexpensiveness or of usefulness. Such, of course, is not the case. The connection is much less immediate. What happens here is what happens generally. Whatever approves itself to us on any ground at the outset, presently comes to appeal to us as a gratifying thing in itself; it comes to rest in our habits of thought as substantially right. But in order that any specific canon of deportment shall maintain itself in favour, it must continue to have the support of, or at least not be incompatible with, the habit or aptitude which constitutes the norm of its development. The need of vicarious leisure, or conspicuous consumption of service, is a dominant incentive to the keeping of servants. So long as this remains true it may be set down without much discussion that any such departure from accepted usage as would suggest an abridged apprenticeship in service would presently be found insufferable. The requirement of an expensive vicarious leisure acts indirectly, selectively, by guiding the formation of our taste-of our sense of what is right in these matters-and so weeds out unconformable departures by withholding approval of them.

As the standard of wealth recognized by common consent advances, the possession and. exploitation of servants as a means of showing superfluity undergoes a refinement. The possession and maintenance of slaves employed in the production of goods argues wealth and prowess, but the maintenance of servants who produce nothing argues still higher wealth and position. Under this principle there arises a class of servants, the more numerous the better, whose sole office is fatuously to wait upon the person of their owner, and so to put in evidence his ability unproductively to consume a large amount of service. There supervenes a division of labour among the servants or dependents whose life is spent in maintaining the honour of the gentleman of leisure. So that, while one group produces goods for him, another group, usually headed by the wife, or chief wife, consumes for him in conspicuous leisure; thereby putting in evidence his ability to sustain large pecuniary damage without impairing his superior opulence.

This somewhat idealized and diagrammatic outline of the development and nature of domestic service comes nearest being true for that cultural stage which has here been named the 'quasi-peaceable' stage of industry. At this stage personal service first rises to the position of an economic institution, and it is at this stage that it occupies the largest place in the community's scheme of life. In the cultural sequence, the quasi-peaceable stage follows the predatory stage proper, the two being successive phases of barbarian life. Its characteristic feature is a formal observance of peace and order, at the same time that life at this stage still has too much of coercion and class antagonism to be called peaceable in the full sense of the word. For many purposes, and from another point of view than the economic one, it might as well be named the stage of status. The method of human relation during this stage, and the spiritual attitude of men at this level of culture, is well summed up under that term. But as a descriptive term to characterise the prevailing methods of industry, as well as to indicate the trend of industrial development at this point in economic evolution, the term 'quasi-peaceable' seems preferable. So far as concerns the communities of the Western culture, this phase of economic development probably lies in the past; except for a numerically small though very conspicuous fraction of the community in whom the habits of thought peculiar to the barbarian culture have suffered but a relatively slight disintegration.

Conspicuous Consumption: Women, Luxury Goods and Connoisseurship

In what has been said of the evolution of the vicarious leisure class and its differentiation from the general body of the working classes, reference has been made to a further division of labour-that between different servant classes. One portion of the servant class, chiefly those persons whose occupation is vicarious leisure, come to undertake a new, subsidiary range of duties-the vicarious consumption of goods. The most obvious form in which this consumption occurs is seen in the wearing of liveries and the occupation of spacious servants' quarters. Another, scarcely less obtrusive or less effective form of vicarious consumption, and a much more widely prevalent one, is the consumption of food, clothing, dwelling, and furniture by the lady and the rest of the domestic establishment.

But already at a point in economic evolution far antedating the emergence of the lady, specialised consumption of goods as an evidence of pecuniary strength had begun to work out in a more or less elaborate system. The beginning of a differentiation in consumption even antedates the appearance of anything that can fairly be called pecuniary strength. It is traceable back to the initial phase of predatory culture, and there is even a suggestion that an incipient differentiation in this respect lies back of the beginnings of the predatory life. This most primitive differentiation in the consumption of goods is like the later differentiation with which we are all so intimately familiar, in that it is largely of a ceremonial character, but unlike the latter it does not rest on a difference in accumulated wealth. The utility of consumption as an evidence of wealth is to be classed as a derivative growth. It is an adaptation to a new end, by a selective process, of a distinction previously existing and well established in men's habits of thought.

In the earlier phases of the predatory culture the only economic differentiation is a broad distinction between an honourable superior class made up of the able-bodied men on the one side, and a base inferior class of labouring women on the other. According to the ideal scheme of life in force at that time it is the office of the men to consume what the women produce. Such consumption as falls to the women is merely incidental to their work; it is a means to their continued labour, and not a consumption directed to their own comfort and fulness of life. Unproductive consumption of goods is honourable, primarily as a mark of prowess and a perquisite of human dignity; secondarily it becomes substantially honourable in itself, especially the consumption of the more desirable things. The consumption of choice articles of food, and frequently also of rare articles of adornment, becomes tabu to the women and children; and if there is a base (servile) class of men, the tabu holds also for them. With a further advance in culture this tabu may change into simple custom of a more or less rigorous character; but whatever be the theoretical basis of the distinction which is maintained, whether it be a tabu or a larger conventionality, the features of the conventional scheme of consumption do not change easily. When the quasipeaceable stage of industry is reached, with its fundamental institution of chattel slavery, the general principle, more or less rigorously applied, is that the base, industrious class should consume only what may be necessary to their subsistence. In the nature of things, luxuries and the comforts of life belong to the leisure class. Under the tabu, certain victuals, and more particularly certain beverages, are strictly reserved for the use of the superior class.

The ceremonial differentiation of the dietary is best seen in the use of intoxicating beverages and narcotics. If these articles of consumption are costly, they are felt to be noble and honorific. Therefore the base classes, primarily the women, practise an enforced continence with respect to these stimulants, except in countries where they are obtainable at a very low cost. From archaic times down through all the length of the patriarchal régime it has been the office of the women to prepare and administer these luxuries, and it has been the perquisite of the men of gentle birth and breeding to consume them. Drunkenness and the other pathological consequences of the free use of stimulants therefore tend in their turn to become honorific, as being a mark, at the second remove, of the superior status of those who are able to afford the indulgence. Infrmities induced by over-indulgence are among some peoples freely recognised as manly attributes. It has even happened that the name for certain diseased conditions of the body arising from such an origin has passed into everyday speech as a synonym for 'noble' or 'gentle'. It is only at a relatively early stage of culture that the symptoms of expensive vice are conventionally accepted as marks of a superior status, and so tend to become virtues and command the deference of the community; but the reputability that attaches to certain expensive vices long retains so much of its force as to appreciably lessen the disapprobation visited upon the men of the wealthy or noble class for any excessive indulgence. The same invidious distinction adds force to the current disapproval of any indulgence of this kind on the part of women, minors, and inferiors. This invidious traditional distinction has not lost its force even among the more advanced peoples of to-day. Where the example set by the leisure class retains its imperative force in the regulation of the conventionalities, it is observable that the women still in great measure practise the same traditional continence with regard to stimulants.

This characterisation of the greater continence in the use of stimulants practised by the women of the reputable classes may seem an excessive refinement of logic at the expense of common sense. But facts within easy reach of any one who cares to know them go to say that the greater abstinence of women is in some part due to an imperative conventionality; and this conventionality is, in a general way, strongest where the patriarchal tradition-the tradition that the woman is a chattel-has retained its hold in greatest vigour. In a sense which has been greatly qualified in scope and rigour, but which has by no means lost its meaning even yet; this tradition says that the woman, being a chattel, should consume only what is necessary to her sustenance-except so far as her further consumption contributes to the comfort or the good repute of her master. The consumption of luxuries, in the true sense, is a consumption directed to the comfort of the consumer himself, and is, therefore, a mark of the master. Any such consumption by others can take place only on a basis of sufferance. In communities where the popular habits of thought have been profoundly shaped by the patriarchal tradition we may accordingly look for survivals of the tabu on luxuries at least to the extent of a conventional deprecation of their use by the unfree and dependent class. This is more particularly true as regards certain luxuries, the use of which by the dependent class would detract sensibly from the comfort or pleasure of their masters, or which are held to be of doubtful legitimacy on other grounds. In the apprehen sionof the great conservative middle class of Western civilisation the use of these various stimulants is obnoxious to at least one, if not both, of these objections; and it is a fact too significant to be passed over that it is precisely among these middle classes of the Germanic culture, with their strong surviving sense of the patriarchal proprieties, that the women are to the greatest extent subject to a qualified tabu on narcotics and alcoholic beverages. With many qualifications-with more qualifications as the patriarchal tradition has gradually weakened-the general rule is felt to be fight and binding that women should consume only for the benefit of their masters. The objection of course presents itself that expenditure on women's dress and household paraphernalia is an obvious exception to this rule; but it will appear in the sequel that this exception is much more obvious than substantial.

During the earlier stages of economic development, consumption of goods without stint, especially consumption of the better grades of goods-ideally all consumption in excess of the subsistence minimum-pertains normally to the leisure class. This restriction tends to disappear, at least formally, after the later peaceable stage has been reached, with private ownership of goods and an industrial system based on wage labour or on the petty household economy. But during the earlier quasipeaceable stage, when so many of the traditions through which the institution of a leisure class has affected the economic life of later times were taking form and consistency, this principle has had the force of a conventional law. It has served as the norm to which consumption has tended to conform, and any appreciable departure from it is to be regarded as an aberrant form, sure to be eliminated sooner or later in the further course of development.

The quasi-peaceable gentleman of leisure, then, not only consumes of the staff of life beyond the minimum required for subsistence and physical efficiency, but his consumption also undergoes a specialisation as regards the quality of the goods consumed. He consumes freely and of the best, in food, drink, narcotics, shelter, services, ornaments, apparel, weapons and accoutrements, amusements, amulets, and idols or divinities. In the process of gradual amelioration which takes place in the articles of his consumption, the motive principle and the proximate aim of innovation is no doubt the higher efficiency of the improved and more elaborate products for personal comfort and well-being. But that does not remain the sole purpose of their consumption. The canon of reputability is at hand and seizes upon such innovations as are, according to its standard, fit to survive. Since the consumption of these more excellent goods is an evidence of wealth, it becomes honorific; and conversely, the failure to consume in due quantity and quality becomes a mark of inferiority and demerit.

This growth of punctilious discrimination as to qualitative excellence in eating, drinking, etc., presently affects not only the manner of life, but also the training and intellectual activity of the gentleman of leisure. He is no longer simply the successful, aggressive male-the man of strength, resource, and intrepidity. In order to avoid stultification he must also cultivate his tastes, for it now becomes incumbent on him to discriminate with some nicety between the noble and the ignoble in consumable goods. He becomes a connoisseur in creditable viands of various degrees of merit, in manly beverages and trinkets, in seemly apparel and architecture, in weapons, games, dancers, and the narcotics. This cultivation of the æsthetic faculty requires time and application, and the demands made upon the gentleman in this direction therefore tend to change his life of leisure into a more or less arduous application to the business of learning how to live a life of ostensible leisure in a becoming way. Closely related to the requirement that the gentleman must consume freely and of the right kind of goods, there is the requirement that he must know how to consume them in a seemly manner. His life of leisure must be conducted in due form. Hence arise good manners in the way pointed out in an earlier chapter. High-bred manners and ways of living are items of conformity to the norm of conspicuous leisure and conspicuous consumption.

Conspicuous consumption of valuable goods is a means of reputability to the gentleman of leisure. As wealth accumulates on his hands, his own unaided effort will not avail to sufficiently put his opulence in evidence by this method. The aid of friends and competitors is therefore brought in by resorting to the giving of valuable presents and expensive feasts and entertainments. Presents and feasts had probably another origin than that of naïve ostentation, but they acquired their utility for this purpose very early, and they have retained that character to the present; so that their utility in this respect has now long been the substantial ground on which these usages rest. Costly entertainments, such as the potlatch or the ball, are peculiarly adapted to serve this end. The competitor with whom the entertainer wishes to institute a comparison is, by this method, made to serve as a means to the end. He consumes vicariously for his host at the same time that he is a witness to the consumption of that excess of good things which his host is unable to dispose of single-handed, and he is also made to witness his host's facility in etiquette.

In the giving of costly entertainments other motives, of a more genial kind, are of course also present. The custom of festive gatherings probably originated in motives of conviviality and religion; these motives are also present in the later development, but they do not continue to be the sole motives. The latter-day leisureclass festivities and entertainments may continue in some slight degree to serve the religious need and in a higher degree the needs of recreation and conviviality, but they also serve an invidious purpose; and they serve it none the less effectually for having a colourable non-invidious ground in these more avowable motives. But the economic effect of these social amenities is not therefore lessened, either in the vicarious consumption of goods or in the exhibition of difficult and costly achievements in etiquette.

As wealth accumulates, the leisure class develops further in function and structure, and there arises a differentiation within the class. There is a more or less elaborate system of rank and grades. This differentiation is furthered by the inheritance of wealth and the consequent inheritance of gentility. With the inheritance of gentility goes the inheritance of obligatory leisure; and gentility of a sufficient potency to entail a life of leisure may be inherited without the complement of wealth required to maintain a dignified leisure. Gentle blood may be transmitted without goods enough to afford a reputably free consumption at one's ease. Hence results a class of impecunious gentlemen of leisure, incidentally referred to already. These half-caste gentlemen of leisure fall into a system of hierarchical gradations. Those who stand near the higher and the highest grades of the wealthy leisure class, in point of birth, or in point of wealth, or both, outrank the remoter-born and the pecuniarily weaker. These lower grades, especially the impecunious, or marginal, gentlemen of leisure, affiliate themselves by a system of dependence or fealty to the great ones; by so doing they gain an increment of repute, or of the means with which to lead a life of leisure, from their patron. They become his courtiers or retainers, servants; and being fed and countenanced by their patron they are indices of his rank and vicarious consumers of his superfluous wealth. Many of these affiliated gentlemen of leisure are at the same time lesser men of substance in their own right; so that some of them are scarcely at all, others only partially, to be rated as vicarious consumers. So many of them, however, as make up the retainers and hangers-on of the patron may be classed as vicarious consumers without qualification. Many of these again, and also many of the other aristocracy of less degree, have in turn attached to their persons a more or less comprehensive group of vicarious consumers in the persons of their wives and children, their servants, retainers, etc.

Throughout this graduated scheme of vicarious leisure and vicarious consumption the rule holds that these offices must be performed in some such manner, or under some such circumstance or insignia, as shall point plainly to the master to whom this leisure or consumption pertains, and to whom therefore the resulting increment of good repute of right inures. The consumption and leisure executed by these persons for their master or patron represents an investment on his part with a view to an increase of good fame. As regards feasts and largesses this is obvious enough, and the imputation of repute to the host or patron here takes place immediately, on the ground of common notoriety. Where leisure and consumption is performed vicariously by henchmen and retainers, imputation of the resulting repute to the patron is effected by their residing near his person so that it may be plain to all men from what source they draw. As the group whose good esteem is to be secured in this way grows larger, more patent means are required to indicate the imputation of merit for the leisure performed, and to this end uniforms, badges, and liveries come into vogue. The wearing of uniforms or liveries implies a considerable degree of dependence, and may even be said to be a mark of servitude, real or ostensible. The wearers of uniforms and liveries may be roughly divided into two classes-the free and the servile, or the noble and the ignoble. The services performed by them are likewise divisible into noble and ignoble. Of course the distinction is not observed with strict consistency in practice; the less debasing of the base services and the less honorific of the noble functions are not infrequently merged in the same person. But the general distinction is not on that account to be overlooked. What may add some perplexity is the fact that this fundamental distinction between noble and ignoble, which rests on the nature of the ostensible service performed, is traversed by a secondary distinction into honorific and humiliating, resting on the rank of the person for whom the service is performed or whose livery is worn. So, those offices which are by right the proper employment of the leisure class are noble; such are government, fighting, hunting, the care of arms and accoutrements, and the like-in short, those which may be classed as ostensibly predatory employments. On the other hand, those employments which properly fall to the industrious class are ignoble; such as handicraft or other productive labour, menial services, and the like. But a base service performed for a person of very high degree may become a very honorific office; as for instance the office of a Maid of Honour or of a Lady in Waiting to the Queen, or the King's Master of the Horse or his Keeper of the Hounds. The two offices last named suggest a principle of some general bearing. Whenever, as in these cases, the menial service in question has to do directly with the primary leisure employments of fighting and hunting, it easily acquires a reflected honorific character. In this way great honour may come to attach to an employment which in its own nature belongs to the baser sort.

In the later development of peaceable industry, the usage of employing an idle corps of uniformed menat-arms gradually lapses. Vicarious consumption by dependents bearing the insignia of their patron or master narrows down to a corps of liveried menials. In a heightened degree, therefore, the livery comes to be a badge of servitude, or rather of servility. Something of a honorific character always attached to the livery of the armed retainer, but this honorific character disappears when the livery becomes the exdusive badge of the menial. The livery becomes obnoxious to nearly all who are required to wear it. We are yet so little removed from a state of effective slavery as still to be fully sensitive to the sting of any imputation of servility. This antipathy asserts itself even in the case of the liveries or uniforms which some corporations prescribe as the distinctive dress of their employees. In this country the aversion even goes the length of discrediting-in a mild and uncertain way-those government employments, military and civil, which require the wearing of a livery or uniform.

With the disappearance of servitude, the number of vicarious consumers attached to any one gentleman tends, on the whole, to decrease. The like is of course true, and perhaps in a still higher degree, of the number of dependents who perform vicarious leisure for him. In a general way, though not wholly nor consistently, these two groups coincide. The dependent who was first delegated for these duties was the wife, or the chief wife; and, as would be expected, in the later development of the institution, when the number of persons by whom these duties are customarily performed gradually narrows, the wife remains the last. In the higher grades of society a large volume of both these kinds of service is required; and here the wife is of course still assisted in the work by a more or less numerous corps of menials. But as we descend the social scale, the point is presently reached where the duties of vicarious leisure and consumption devolve upon the wife alone. In the communities of the Western culture, this point is at present found among the lower middle class.

And here occurs a curious inversion. It is a fact of common observation that in this lower middle class there is no pretence of leisure on the part of the head of the household. Through force of circumstances it has fallen into disuse. But the middle-class wife still carries on the business of vicarious leisure, for the good name of the household and its master. In descending the social scale in any modem industrial community, the primary fact-the conspicuous leisure of the master of the house-hold-disappears at a relatively high point. The head of the middle-class household has been reduced by economic circumstances to turn his hand to gaining a livelihood by occupations which often partake largely of the character of industry, as in the case of the ordinary business man of to-day. But the derivative fact-the vicarious leisure and consumption rendered by the wife, and the auxiliary vicarious performance of leisure by menials-remains in vogue as a conventionality which the demands of reputability will not suffer to be slighted. It is by no means an uncommon spectacle to find a man applying himself to work with the utmost assiduity, in order that his wife may in due form render for him that degree of vicarious leisure which the common sense of the time demands.

The leisure rendered by the wife in such cases is, of course, not a simple manifestation of idleness or indolence. It almost invariably occurs disguised under some form of work or household duties or social amenities, which prove on analysis to serve little or no ulterior end beyond showing that she does not and need not occupy herself with anything that is gainful or that is of substantial use. As has already been noticed under the head of manners, the greater part of the customary round of domestic cares to which the middle-class housewife gives her time and effort is of this character. Not that the results of her attention to household matters, of a decorative and mundificatory character, are not pleasing to the sense of men trained in middleclass proprieties; but the taste to which these effects of household adornment and tidiness appeal is a taste which has been formed under the selective guidance of a canon of propriety that demands just these evidences of wasted effort. The effects are pleasing to us chiefly because we have been taught to find them pleasing. There goes into these domestic duties much solicitude for a proper combination of form and colour, and for other ends that are to be classed as æsthetic in the proper sense of the term; and it is not denied that effects having some substantial æsthetic value are sometimes attained. Pretty much all that is here insisted on is that, as regards these amenities of life, the housewife's efforts are under the guidance of traditions that have been shaped by the law of conspicuously wasteful expenditure of time and substance. If beauty or comfort is achieved-and it is a more or less fortuitous circumstance if they are-they must be achieved by means and methods that commend themselves to the great economic law of wasted effort. The more reputable, 'presentable' portion of middleclass household paraphernalia are, on the one hand, items of conspicuous consumption, and on the other hand, apparatus for putting in evidence the vicarious leisure rendered by the housewife.

The requirement of vicarious consumption at the hands of the wife continues in force even at a lower point in the pecuniary scale than the requirement of vicarious leisure. At a point below which little if any pretence of wasted effort, in ceremonial cleanness and the like, is observable, and where there is assuredly no conscious attempt at ostensible leisure, decency still requires the wife to consume some goods conspicuously for the reputability of the household and its head. So that, as the latter-day outcome of this evolution of an archaic institution, the wife, who was at the outset the drudge and chattel of the man, both in fact and in theory-the producer of goods for him to consume-has become the ceremonial consumer of goods which he produces. But she still quite unmistakably remains his chattel in theory; for the habitual rendering of vicarious leisure and consumption is the abiding mark of the unfree servant.

This vicarious consumption practised by the household of the middle and lower classes can not be counted as a direct expression of the leisure-class scheme of life, since the household of this pecuniary grade does not belong within the leisure class. It is rather that the leisure-class scheme of life here comes to an expression at the second remove. The leisure class stands at the head of the social structure in point of reputability; and its manner of life and its standards of worth therefore afford the norm of reputability for the community. The observance of these standards, in some degree of approximation, becomes incumbent upon all classes lower in the scale. In modem civilized communities the lines of demarcation between social classes have grown vague and transient, and wherever this happens the norm of reputability imposed by the upper class extends its coercive influence with but slight hindrance down through the social structure to the lowest strata. The result is that the members of each stratum accept as their ideal of decency the scheme of life in vogue in the next higher stratum, and bend their energies to live up to that ideal. On pain of forfeiting their good name and their self-respect in case of failure, they must conform to the accepted code, at least in appearance.

The basis on which good repute in any highly organised industrial community ultimately rests is pecuniary strength; and the means of showing pecuniary strength, and so of gaining or retaining a good name, are leisure and a conspicuous consumption of goods. Accordingly, both of these methods are in vogue as far down the scale as it remains possible; and in the lower strata in which the two methods are employed, both offices are in great part delegated to the wife and children of the household. Lower still, where any degree of leisure, even ostensible, has become impracticable for the wife, the conspicuous consumption of goods remains and is carried on by the wife and children. The man of the household also can do something in this direction, and, indeed, he commonly does; but with a still lower descent into the levels of indigence-along the margin of the slums-the man, and presently also the children, virtually cease to consume valuable goods for appearances, and the woman remains virtually the sole exponent of the household's pecuniary decency. No class of society, not even the most abjectly poor, foregoes all customary conspicuous consumption. The last items of this category of consumption are not given up except under stress of the direst necessity. Very much of squalor and discomfort will be endured before the last trinket or the last pretence of pecuniary decency is put away. There is no class and no country that has yielded so abjectly before the pressure of physical want as to deny themselves all gratification of this higher or spiritual need.

Canons of Taste: Greenery and Pets

Everyday life affords many curious illustrations of the way in which the code of pecuniary beauty in articles of use varies from class to class, as well as of the way in which the conventional sense of beauty departs in its deliverances from the sense untutored by the requirements of pecuniary repute. Such a fact is the lawn, or the close-cropped yard or park, which appeals so unaffectedly to the taste of the Western peoples. It appears especially to appeal to the tastes of the well-to-do classes in those communities in which the dolicho-blond element predominates in an appreciable degree. The lawn unquestionably has an element of sensuous beauty, simply as an object of apperception, and as such no doubt it appeals pretty directly to the eye of nearly all races and all classes; but it is, perhaps, more unquestionably beautiful to the eye of the dolicho-blond than to most other varieties of men. This higher appreciation of a stretch of greensward in this ethnic element than in the other elements of the population, goes along with certain other features of the dolicho-blond temperament that indicate that this racial element has once been for a long time a pastoral people inhabiting a region with a humid climate. The close-cropped lawn is beautiful in the eyes of a people whose inherited bent it is to readily find pleasure in contemplating a well-preserved pasture or grazing land.

For the æsthetic purpose the lawn is a cow pasture; and in some cases to-day-where the expensiveness of the attendant circumstances bars out any imputation of thrift-the idyl of the dolicho-blond is rehabilitated in the introduction of a cow into a lawn or private ground. In such cases the cow made use of is commonly of an expensive breed. The vulgar suggestion of thrift, which is nearly inseparable from the cow, is a standing objection to the decorative use of this animal. So that in all cases, except where luxurious surroundings negative this suggestion, the use of the cow as an object of taste must be avoided. Where the predilection for some grazing animal to fill out the suggestion of the pasture is too strong to be suppressed, the cow's place is often given to some more or less inadequate substitute, such as deer, antelopes, or some such exotic beast. These substitutes, although less beautiful to the pastoral eye of Western man than the cow, are in such cases preferred because of their superior expensiveness or futility, and their consequent repute. They are not vulgarly lucrative either in fact or in suggestion.

Public parks of course fall in the same category with the lawn; they too, at their best, are imitations of the pasture. Such a park is of course best kept by grazing, and the cattle on the grass are themselves no mean addition to the beauty of the thing, as need scarcely be insisted on with any one who has once seen a wellkept pasture. But it is worth noting, as an expression of the pecuniary element in popular taste, that such a method of keeping public grounds is seldom resorted to. The best that is done by skilled workmen under the supervision of a trained keeper is a more or less close imitation of a pasture, but the result invariably falls somewhat short of the artistic effect of grazing. But to the average popular apprehension a herd of cattle so pointedly suggests thrift and usefulness that their presence in the public pleasure ground would be intolerably cheap. This method of keeping grounds is comparatively inexpensive, therefore it is indecorous.

Of the same general bearing is another feature of public grounds. There is a studious exhibition of expensiveness coupled with a make-believe of simplicity and crude serviceability. Private grounds also show the same physiognomy wherever they are in the management or ownership of persons whose tastes have been formed under middle-class habits of life or under the upperclass traditions of no later a date than the childhood of the generation that is now passing. Grounds which conform to the instructed tastes of the latter-day upper class do not show these features in so marked a degree. The reason for this difference in tastes between the past and the incoming generation of the well-bred lies in the changing economic situation. A similar difference is perceptible in other respects, as well as in the accepted ideals of pleasure grounds. In this country as in most others, until the last half century but a very small proportion of the population were possessed of such wealth as would exempt them from thrift. Owing to imperfect means of communication, this small fraction were scattered and out of effective touch with one another. There was therefore no basis for a growth of taste in disregard of expensiveness. The revolt of the well-bred taste against vulgar thrift was unchecked. Wherever the unsophisticated sense of beauty might show itself sporadically in an approval of inexpensive or thrifty surroundings, it would lack the 'social confrmafion' which nothing but a considerable body of like-minded people can give. There was, therefore, no effective upper-class opinion that would overlook evidences of possible inexpensiveness in the management of grounds; and there was consequently no appreciable divergence between the leisure-class and the lower middle-class ideal in the physiognomy of pleasure grounds. Both classes equally constructed their ideals with the fear of pecuniary disrepute before their eyes.

To-day a divergence in ideals is beginning to be apparent. The portion of the leisure class that has been consistently exempt from work and from pecuniary cares for a generation or more is now large enough to form and sustain an opinion in matters of taste. Increased mobility of the members has also added to the facility with which a 'social confirmation' can be attained within the class. Within this select class the exemption from thrift is a matter so commonplace as to have lost much of its utility as a basis of pecuniary decency. Therefore the latter-day upper-class canons of taste do not so consistently insist on an unremitting demonstration of expensiveness and a strict exclusion of the appearance of thrift. So, a predilection for the rustic and the 'natural' in parks and grounds makes its appearance on these higher social and intellectual levels. This predilection is in large part an outcropping of the instinct of workmanship; and it works out its results with varying degrees of consistency. It is seldom altogether unaffected, and at times it shades off into something not widely different from that makebelieve of rusticity which has been referred to above.

A weakness for crudely serviceable contrivances that pointedly suggest immediate and wasteless use is present even in the middle-class tastes; but it is there kept well in hand under the unbroken dominance of the canon of reputable futility. Consequently it works out in a variety of ways and means for shamming serviceability-in such contrivances as rustic fences, bridges, bowers, pavilions, and the like decorative features. An expression of this affectation of serviceability, at what is Perhaps its widest divergence from the first promptings of the sense of economic beauty, is afforded by the cast-iron rustic fence and trellis or by a circuitous drive laid across level ground.

The select leisure class has outgrown the use of these pseudo-serviceable variants of pecuniary beauty, at least at some points. But the taste of the more recent accessions to the leisure class proper and of the middle and lower classes still requires a pecuniary beauty to supplement the æsthetic beauty, even in those objects which are primarily admired for the beauty that belongs to them as natural growths.

The popular taste in these matters is to be seen in the prevalent high appreciation of topiary work and of the conventional flower-beds of public grounds. Perhaps as happy an illustration as may be had of this dominance of pecuniary beauty over æsthetic beauty in middle- class tastes is seen in the reconstruction of the grounds lately occupied by the Columbian Exposition. The evidence goes to show that the requirement of reputable expensiveness is still present in good vigour even where all ostensibly lavish display is avoided. The artistic effects actually wrought in this work of reconstruction diverge somewhat widely from the effect to which the same ground would have lent itself in hands not guided by pecuniary canons of taste. And even the better class of the city's population view the progress of the work with an unreserved approval which suggests that there is in this case little if any discrepancy between the tastes of the upper and the lower or middle classes of the city. The sense of beauty in the population of this representative city of the advanced pecuniary culture is very chary of any departure from its great cultural principle of conspicuous waste.

The love of nature, perhaps itself borrowed from a higher-class code of taste, sometimes expresses itself in unexpected ways under the guidance of this canon of pecuniary beauty, and leads to results that may seem incongruous to an unreflecting beholder. The wellaccepted practice of planting trees in the treeless areas of this country, for instance, has been carried over as an item of honorific expenditure into the heavily wooded areas; so that it is by no means unusual for a village or a farmer in the wooded country to dear the land of its native trees and immediately replant saplings of certain introduced varieties about the farmyard or along the streets. In this way a forest growth of oak, elm, beech, butternut, hemlock, basswood, and birch is cleared off to give room for saplings of soft maple, cottonwood, and brittle willow. It is felt that the inexpensiveness of leaving the forest trees standing would derogate from the dignity that should invest an article which is intended to serve a decorative and honorific end.

The like pervading guidance of taste by pecuniary repute is traceable in the prevalent standards of beauty in animals. The part played by this canon of taste in assigning her place in the popular æsthetic scale to the cow has already been spoken of. Something to the same effect is true of the other domestic animals, so far as they are in an appreciable degree industrially useful to the community-as, for instance, barnyard fowl, hogs, cattle, sheep, goats, draught-horses. They are of the nature of productive goods, and serve a useful, often a lucrative end; therefore beauty is not readily imputed to them. The case is different with those domestic animals which ordinarily serve no industrial end; such as pigeons, parrots and other cage-birds, cats, dogs, and fast horses. These commonly are items of conspicuous consumption, and are therefore honorific in their nature and may legitimately be accounted beautiful. This class of animals are conventionally admired by the body of the upper classes, while the pecuniarily lower classes-and that select minority of the leisure class among whom the rigorous canon that abjures thrift is in a measure obsolescent-find beauty in one class of animals as in another, without drawing a hard and fast line of pecuniary demarcation between the beautiful and the ugly.

In the case of those domestic animals which are honorific and are reputed beautiful, there is a subsidiary basis of merit that should be spoken of. Apart from the birds which belong in the honorific class of domestic animals, and which owe their place in this class to their non-lucrative character alone, the animals which merit particular attention are cats, dogs, and fast horses. The cat is less reputable than the other two just named, because she is less wasteful; she may even serve a useful end. At the same time the cat's temperament does not fit her for the honorific purpose. She lives with man on terms of equality, knows nothing of that relation of status which is the ancient basis of all distinctions of worth, honour, and repute, and she does not lend herself with facility to an invidious comparison between her owner and his neighbours. The exception to this last rule occurs in the case of such scarce and fanciful products as the Angora cat, which have some slight honorific value on the ground of expensiveness, and have, therefore, some special claim to beauty on pecuniary grounds.

The dog has advantages in the way of uselessness as well as in special gifts of temperament. He is often spoken of, in an eminent sense, as the friend of man, and his intelligence and fidelity are praised. The meaning of this is that the dog is man's servant and that he has the gift of an unquestioning subservience and a slave's quickness in guessing his master's mood. Coupled with these traits, which fit him well for the relation of status-and which must for the present purpose be set down as serviceable traits-the dog has some characteristics which are of a more equivocal æsthetic value. He is the filthiest of the domestic animals in his person and the nastiest in his habits. For this he makes up in a servile, fawning attitude towards his master, and a readiness to inflict damage and discomfort on all else. The dog, then, commends himself to our favour by affording play to our propensity for mastery, and as he is also an item of expense, and commonly serves no industrial purpose, he holds a well-assured place in men's regard as a thing of good repute. The dog is at the same time associated in our imagination with the chase-a meritorious employ-ment and an expression of the honourable predatory impulse.

Standing on this vantage ground, whatever beauty of form and motion and whatever commendable mental traits he may possess are conventionally acknowledged and magnified. And even those varieties of the dog which have been bred into grotesque deformity by the dog-fancier are in good faith accounted beautiful by many. These varieties of dogs-and the like is true of other fancy-bred animals-are rated and graded inæsthetic value somewhat in proportion to the degree of grotesqueness and instability of the particular fashion which the deformity takes in the given case. For the purpose in hand, this differential utility on the ground of grotesqueness and instability of structure is reducible to terms of a greater scarcity and consequent expense. The commercial value of canine monstrosities, such as the prevailing styles of pet dogs both for men's and women's use, rests on their high cost of production, and their value to their owners lies chiefly in their utility as items of conspicuous consumption. Indirectly, through reflection upon their honorific expensiveness, a social worth is imputed to them; and so, by an easy substitution of words and ideas, they come to be admired and reputed beautiful. Since any attention bestowed upon these animals is in no sense gainful or useful, it is also reputable; and since the habit of giving them attention is consequenfiy not deprecated, it may grow into an habitual attachment of great tenacity and of a most benevolent character. So that in the affection bestowed on pet animals the canon of expensiveness is present more or less remotely as a norm which guides and shapes the sentiment and the selection of its object. The like is true, as will be noticed presently, with respect to affection for persons also; although the manner in which the norm acts in that case is somewhat different.

The case of the fast horse is much like that of the dog. He is on the whole expensive, or wasteful and useless-for the industrial purpose. What productive use he may possess, in the way of enhancing the wellbeing of the community or making the way of life easier for men, takes the form of exhibitions of force and facility of motion that gratify the popular æsthetic sense. This is of course a substantial serviceability. The horse is not endowed with the spiritual aptitude for servile dependence in the same measure as the dog; but he ministers effectually to his master's impulse to convert the 'animate' forces of the environment to his own use and discretion and so express his own dominating individuality through them. The fast horse is at least potentially a race-horse, of high or low degree; and it is as such that he is peculiarly serviceable to his owner. The utility of the fast horse lies largely in his efficiency as a means of emulation; it gratifies the owner's sense of aggression and dominance to have his own horse outstrip his neighbour's. This use being not lucrative, but on the whole pretty consistently wasteful, and quite conspicuously so, it is honorific, and therefore gives the fast horse a strong presumptive position of reputability. Beyond this, the race horse proper has also a similarly non-industrial but honorific use as a gambling instrument.

The fast horse, then, is æsthetically fortunate, in that the canon of pecuniary good repute legitimates a free appreciation of whatever beauty or serviceability he may possess. His pretensions have the countenance of the principle of conspicuous waste and the backing of the predatory aptitude for dominance and emulation. The horse is, moreover, a beautiful animal, although the race-horse is so in no peculiar degree to the uninstructed taste of those persons who belong neither in the class of race-horse fanciers nor in the class whose sense of beauty is held in abeyance by the moral constraint of the horse fancier's award. To this untutored taste the most beautiful horse seems to be a form which has suffered less radical alteration than the race-horse under the breeder's selective development of the animal. Still, when a writer or speaker-especially of those whose eloquence is most consistently commonplace-wants an illustration of animal grace and serviceability, for rhetorical use, he habitually turns to the horse; and he commonly makes it plain before he is done that what he has in mind is the race-horse.

It should be noted that in the graduated appreciation of varieties of horses and of dogs, such as one meets with among people of even moderately cultivated tastes in these matters, there is also discernible another and more direct line of influence of the leisure-class canons of reputability. In this country, for instance, leisure-class tastes are to some extent shaped on usages and habits which prevail, or which are apprehended to prevail, among the leisure class of Great Britain. In dogs this is true to a less extent than in horses. In horses, more particularly in saddle horses-which at their best serve the purpose of wasteful display simply-it will hold true in a general way that a horse is more beautiful in proportion as he is more English; the English leisure class being, for purposes of reputable usage, the upper leisure class of this country, and so the exemplar for the lower grades. This mimicry in the methods of the apperception of beauty and in the forming of judgrnents of taste need not result in a spurious, or at any rate not a hypocritical or affected, predilection. The predilection is as serious and as substantial an award of taste when it rests on this basis as when it rests on any other; the difference is that this taste is a taste for the reputably correct, not for the æsthetically true.

The mimicry, it should be said, extends further than to the sense of beauty in horseflesh simply. It includes trappings and horsemanship as well, so that the correct or reputably beautiful seat or posture is also decided by English usage, as well as the equestrian gait. To show how fortuitous may sometimes be the circumstances which decide what shall be becoming and what not under the pecuniary canon of beauty, it may be noted that this English seat, and the peculiarly distressing gait which has made an awkward seat necessary, are a survival from the time when the English roads were so bad with mire and mud as to be virtually impassable for a horse travelling at a more comfortable gait; so that a person of decorous tastes in horsemanship to-day rides a punch with docked tail, in an uncomfortable posture and at a distressing gait, because the English roads during a great part of the last century were impassable for a horse travelling at a more horse-like gait, or for an animal built for moving with ease over the firm and open country to which the horse is indigenous.

Admission to the Leisure Class

The constituency of the leisure class is kept up by a continual selective process, whereby the individuals and lines of descent that are eminently fitted for an aggressive pecuniary competition are withdrawn from the lower classes. In order to reach the upper levels the aspirant must have, not only a fair average complement of the pecuniary aptitudes, but he must have these gifts in such an eminent degree as to overcome very material difficulties that stand in the way of his ascent. Barring accidents, the nouveaux arrivés are a picked body.

This process of selective admission has, of course, always been going on; ever since the fashion of pecuniary emulation set in-which is much the same as saying, ever since the institution of a leisure class was first installed. But the precise ground of selection has not always been the same, and the selective process has therefore not always given the same results. In the early barbarian, or predatory stage proper, the test of fitness was prowess, in the naïve sense of the word. To gain entrance to the class, the candidate must be gifted with clannishness, massiveness, ferocity, unscrupulousness, and tenacity of purpose. These were the qualities that counted toward the accumulation and continued tenure of wealth. The economic basis of the leisure class, then as later, was the possession of wealth; but the methods of accumulating wealth, and the gifts required for holding it, have changed in some degree since the early days of the predatory culture. In consequence of the selective process the dominant traits of the early barbarian leisure class were bold aggression, an alert sense of status, and a free resort to fraud. The members of the class held their place by tenure of prowess. In the later barbarian culture society attained settled methods of acquisition and possession under the quasi-peaceable régime of status. Simple aggression and unrestrained violence in great measure gave place to shrewd practise and chicanery, as the best approved method of accumulating wealth. A different range of aptitudes and propensities would then be conserved in the leisure class. Masterful aggression, and the correlative massiveness, together with a ruthlessly consistent sense of status, would still count among the most splendid traits of the class. These have remained in our traditions as the typical 'aristocratic virtues'. But with these were associated an increasing complement of the less obtrusive pecuniary virtues; such as providence, prudence, and chicane. As time has gone on, and the modem peaceable stage of pecuniary culture has been approached, the last-named range of aptitudes and habits has gained in relative effectiveness for pecuniary ends, and they have counted for relatively more in the selective process under which admission is gained and place is held in the leisure class.

The ground of selection has changed, until the aptitudes which now qualify for admission to the class are the pecuniary aptitudes only. What remains of the predatory barbarian traits is the tenacity of purpose or consistency of aim which distinguished the successful predatory barbarian from the peaceable savage whom he supplanted. But this trait can not be said characteristically to distinguish the pecuniarily successful upper-class man from the rank and file of the industrial classes. The training and the selection to which the latter are exposed in modem industrial life give a similarly decisive weight to this trait. Tenacity of purpose may rather be said to distinguish both these classes from two others: the shiftless ne'er-do-weel and the lower-class delinquent. In point of natural endowment the pecuniary man compares with the delinquent in much the same way as the industrial man compares with the good-natured shiftless dependent. The ideal pecuniary man is like the. ideal delinquent in his unscrupulous conversion of goods and persons to his own ends, and in a callous disregard of the feelings and wishes of others and of the remoter effects of his actions; but he is unlike him in possessing a keener sense of status, and in working more consistently and far-sightedly to a remoter end. The kinship of the two types of temperament is further shown in a proclivity to 'sport' and gambling, and a relish of aimless emulation. The ideal pecuniary man also shows a curious kinship with the delinquent in one of the concomitant variations of the predatory human nature. The delinquent is very commonly of a superstitious habit of mind; he is a great believer in luck, spells, divination and destiny, and in omens and shamanistic ceremony. Where circumstances are favourable, this proclivity is apt to express itself in a certain servile devotional fervour and a punctilious attention to devout observances; it may perhaps be better characterised as devoutness than as religion. At this point the temperament of the delinquent has more in common with the pecuniary and leisure classes than with the industrial man or with the class of shiftless dependents.

Survivals of Primitive Male Prowess: Fighting and Sports

The most immediate and unequivocal expression of that archaic human nature which characterises man in the predatory stage is the fighting propensity proper. In cases where the predatory activity is a collective one, this propensity is frequently called the martial spirit, or, latterly, patriotism. It needs no insistence to find assent to the proposition that in the countries of civilised Europe the hereditary leisure class is endowed with this martial spirit in a higher degree than the middle classes. Indeed, the leisure class claims the distinction as a matter of pride, and no doubt with some grounds. War is honourable, and warlike prowess is eminently honorific in the eyes of the generality of men; and this admiration of warlike prowess is itself the best voucher of a predatory temperament in the admirer of war. The enthusiasm for war, and the predatory temper of which it is the index, prevail in the largest measure among the upper classes, especially among the hereditary leisure class. Moreover, the ostensible serious occupation of the upper class is that of government, which, in point of origin and developmental content, is also a predatory occupation.

The only class which could at all dispute with the hereditary leisure class the honour of an habitual bellicose frame of mind is that of the lower-class delinquents. In ordinary times, the large body of the industrial classes is relatively apathetic touching warlike interests. When unexcited, this body of the common people, which makes up the effective force of the industrial community, is rather averse to any other than a defensive fight; indeed, it responds a little tardily even to a provocation which makes for an attitude of defence. In the more civilised communities, or rather in the communities which have reached an advanced industrial development, the spirit of warlike aggression may be said to be obsolescent among the common people. This does not say that there is not an appreciable number of individuals among the industrial classes in whom the martial spirit asserts itself obtrusively. Nor does it say that the body of the people may not be fired with martial ardour for a time under the stimulus of some special provocation, such as is seen in operation to-day in more than one of the countries of Europe, and for the time in America. But except for such seasons of temporary exaltation, and except for those individuals who are endowed with an archaic temperament of the predatory type, together with the similarly endowed body of individuals among the higher and the lowest classes, the inertness of the mass of any modem civilised community in this respect is probably so great as would make war impracticable, except against actual invasion. The habits and aptitudes of the common run of men make for an unfolding of activity in other, less picturesque directions than that of war.

This class difference in temperament may be due in part to a difference in the inheritance of acquired traits in the several classes, but it seems also, in some measure, to correspond with a difference in ethnic derivation. The class difference is in this respect visibly less in those countries whose population is relatively homogeneous, ethnically, than in the countries where there is a broader divergence between the ethnic elements that make up the several classes of the community. In the same connection it may be noted that the later accessions to the leisure class in the latter countries, in a general way, show less of the martial spirit than contemporary representatives of the aristocracy of the ancient line. These nouveaux arrives have recently emerged from the commonplace body of the population and owe their emergence into the leisure class to the exercise of traits and propensities which are not to be classed as prowess in the ancient sense.

Apart from warlike activity proper, the institution of the duel is also an expression of the same superior readiness for combat; and the duel is a leisure-class institution. The duel is in substance a more or less deliberate resort to a fight as a final settlement of a difference of opinion. In civilised communities it prevails as a normal phenomenon only where there is an hereditary leisure class, and almost exclusively among that class. The exceptions are (1) military and naval officers-who are ordinarily members of the leisure class, and who are at the same time specially trained to predatory habits of mind-and (2) the lower-class delinquents-who are by inheritance, or training, or both, of a similarly predatory disposition and habit. It is only the high-bred gentleman and the rowdy that normally resort to blows as the universal solvent of differences of opinion. The plain man will ordinarily fight only when excessive momentary irritation or alcoholic exaltation act to inhibit the more complex habits of response to the stimuli that make for provocation. He is then thrown back upon the simpler, less differentiated forms of the instinct of self-assertion; that is to say, he reverts temporarily and without reflection to an archaic habit of mind.

This institution of the duel as a mode of finally settling disputes and serious questions of precedence shades off into the obligatory, unprovoked private fight, as a social obligation due to one's good repute. As a leisure-class usage of this kind we have, particularly, that bizarre survival of bellicose chivalry, the German student duel. In the lower or spurious leisure class of the delinquents there is in all countries a similar, though less formal, social obligation incumbent on the rowdy to assert his manhood in unprovoked combat with his fellows. And spreading through all grades of society, a similar usage prevails among the boys of the community. The boy usually knows to a nicety, from day to day, how he and his associates grade in respect of relative fighting capacity; and in the community of boys there is ordinarily no secure basis of reputability for any one who, by exception, will not or can not fight on invitation.

All this applies especially to boys above a certain somewhat vague limit of maturity. The child's temperament does not commonly answer to this description during infancy and the years of close tutelage, when the child still habitually seeks contact with its mother at every turn of its daily life. During this earlier period there is little aggression and little propensity for antagonism. The transition from this peaceable temper to the predaceous, and in extreme cases malignant, mischievousness of the boy is a gradual one, and it is accomplished with more completeness, covering a larger range of the individual's aptitudes, in some cases than in others. In the earlier stage of his growth, the child, whether boy or girl, shows less of initiative and aggressive self-assertion and less of an inclination to isolate himself and his interests from the domestic group in which he lives, and he shows more of sensitiveness to rebuke, bashfulness, timidity, and the need of friendly human contact. In the common run of cases this early temperament passes, by a gradual but somewhat rapid obsolescence of the infantile features, into the temperament of the boy proper; though there are also cases where the predaceous features of boy life do not emerge at all, or at the most emerge in but a slight and obscure degree.

In girls the transition to the predaceous stage is seldom accomplished with the same degree of completeness as in boys; and in a relatively large proportion of cases it is scarcely undergone at all. In such cases the transition from infancy to adolescence and maturity is a gradual and unbroken process of the shifting of interest from infantile purposes and aptitudes to the purposes, functions, and relations of adult life. In the gifts there is a less general prevalence of a predaceous interval in the development; and in the cases where it occurs, the predaceous and isolating attitude during the interval is commonly less accentuated.

In the male child the predaceous interval is ordinarily fairly well marked and lasts for some time, but it is commonly terminated (if at all) with the attainment of maturity. This last statement may need very material qualification. The cases are by no means rare in which the transition from the boyish to the adult temperament is not made, or is made only partially-understanding by the 'adult' temperament the average temperament of those adult individuals in modem industrial life who have some serviceability for the purposes of the collective life process, and who may therefore be said to make up the effective average of the industrial community.

The ethnic composition of the European populations varies. In some cases even the lower classes are in large measure made up of the peace-disturbing dolichoblond; while in others this ethnic element is found chiefly among the hereditary leisure class. The fighting habit seems to prevail to a less extent among the working-class boys in the latter class of populations than among the boys of the upper classes or among those of the populations first named.

If this generalisation as to the temperament of the boy among the working classes should be found true on a fuller and closer scrutiny of the field, it would add force to the view that the bellicose temperament is in some appreciable degree a race characteristic; it appears to enter more largely into the make-up of the dominant, upper-class ethnic type-the dolicho-blond-of the European countries than into the subservient, lowerclass types of man which are conceived to constitute the body of the population of the same communities.

The case of the boy may seem not to bear seriously on the question of the relative endowment of prowess with which the several classes of society are gifted; but it is at least of some value as going to show that this fighting impulse belongs to a more archaic temperament than that possessed by the average adult man of the industrious classes. In this, as in many other features of child life, the child reproduces, temporarily and in miniature, some of the earlier phases of the development of adult man. Under this interpretation, the boy's predilection for exploit and for isolation of his own interest is to be taken as a transient reversion to the human nature that is normal to the early barbarian culture-the predatory culture proper. In this respect, as in much else, the leisure-class and the delinquentclass character shows a persistence into adult life of traits that are normal to childhood and youth, and that are likewise normal or habitual to the earlier stages of culture. Unless the difference is traceable entirely to a fundamental difference between persistent ethnic types, the traits that distinguish the swaggering delinquent and the punctilious gentleman of leisure from the common crowd are, in some measure, marks of an arrested spiritual development. They mark an immature phase, as compared with the stage of development attained by the average of the adults in the modem industrial community. And it will appear presently that the puerile spiritual make-up of these representatives of the upper and the lowest social strata shows itself also in the presence of other archaic traits than this proclivity to ferocious exploit and isolation.

As if to leave no doubt about the essential immaturity of the fighting temperament, we have, bridging the interval between legitimate boyhood and adult man-hood, the aimless and playful, but more or less systematic and elaborate, disturbances of the peace in vogue among schoolboys of a slightly higher age. In the common run of cases, these disturbances are confined to the period of adolescence. They recur with decreasing frequency and acuteness as youth merges into adult life, and so they reproduce, in a general way, in the life of the individual, the sequence by which the group has passed from the predatory to a more settled habit of life. In an appreciable number of cases the spiritual growth of the individual comes to a close before he emerges from this puerile phase; in these cases the fighting temper persists through life. Those individuals who in spiritual development eventually reach man's estate, therefore, ordinarily pass through a temporary archaic phase corresponding to the permanent spiritual level of the fighting and sporting men. Different individuals will, of course, achieve spiritual maturity and sobriety in this respect in different degrees; and those who fail of the average remain as an undissolved residue of crude humanity in the modern industrial community and as a foil for that selective process of adaptation which makes for a heightened industrial efficiency and the fulness of life of the collectivity.

This arrested spiritual development may express itself not only in a direct participation by adults in youthful exploits of ferocity, but also indirectly in aiding and abetting disturbances of this kind on the part of younger persons. It thereby furthers the formation of habits of ferocity which may persist in the later life of the growing generation, and so retard any movement in the direction of a more peaceable effective temperament on the part of the community. If a person so endowed with a proclivity for exploits is in a position to guide the development of habits in the adolescent members of the community, the influence which he exerts in the direction of conservation and reversion to prowess may be very considerable. This is the significance, for instance, of the fostering care latterly bestowed by many clergymen and other pillars of society upon 'boys' brigades' and similar pseudo-military organisations. The same is ture of the encouragement given to the growth of 'college spirit', college athletics, and the like, in the higher institutions of learning.

These manifestations of the predatory temperament are all to be classed under the head of exploit. They are partly simple and unreflected expressions of an attitude of emulative ferocity, partly activities deliberately entered upon with a view to gaining repute for prowess. Sports of all kinds are of the same general character, including prize-fights, bull-fights, athletics, shooting, angling, yachting, and games of skill, even where the element of destructive physical efficiency is not an obtrusive feature. Sports shade off from the basis of hostile combat, through skill, to cunning and chicanery, without its being possible to draw a line at any point. The ground of an addiction to sports is an archaic spiritual constitution-the possession of the predatory emulative propensity in a relatively high potency. A strong proclivity to adventuresome exploit and to the infliction of damage is especially pronounced in those employments which are in colloquial usage specifically called sportsmanship.

It is perhaps truer, or at least more evident, as regards sports than as regards the other expressions of predatory emulation already spoken of, that the temperament which inclines men to them is essentially a boyish temperament. The addiction to sports, therefore, in a peculiar degree marks an arrested development of the man's moral nature. This peculiar boyishness of temperament in sporting men immediately becomes apparent when attention is directed to the large element of make-believe that is present in all sporting activity. Sports share this character of make-believe with the games and exploits to which children, especially boys, are habitually inclined. Make-believe does not enter in the same proportion into all sports, but it is present in a very appreciable degree in all. It is apparently present in a larger measure in sportsmanship proper and in athletic contests than in set games of skill of a more sedentary character; although this rule may not be found to apply with any great uniformity. It is noticeable, for instance, that even very mild-mannered and matter-of-fact men who go out shooting are apt to carry an excess of arms and accoutrements in order to impress upon their own imagination the seriousness of their undertaking. These huntsmen are also prone to a histrionic, prancing gait and to an elaborate exaggeration of the motions, whether of stealth or of onslaught, involved in their deeds of exploit. Similarly in athletic sports there is almost invariably present a good share of rant and swagger and ostensible mystification-features which mark the histrionic nature of these employments. In all this, of course, the reminder of boyish makebelieve is plain enough. The slang of athletics, by the way, is in great part made up of extremely sanguinary locutions borrowed from the terminology of warfare. Except where it is adopted as a necessary means of secret communication, the use of a special slang in any employment is probably to be accepted as evidence that the occupation in question is substantially makebelieve.

A further feature in which sports differ from the duel and similar disturbances of the peace is the peculiarity that they admit of other motives being assigned for them besides the impulses of exploit and ferocity. There is probably little if any other motive present in any given case, but the fact that other reasons for indulging in sports are frequently assigned goes to say that other grounds are sometimes present in a subsidiary way. Sportsmen-hunters and anglers-are more or less in the habit of assigning a love of nature, the need of recreation, and the like, as the incentives to their favourite pastime. These motives are no doubt frequently present and make up a part of the attractiveness of the sportsman's life; but these can not be the chief incentives. These ostensible needs could be more readily and fully satisfied without the accompaniment of a systematic effort to take the life of those creatures that make up an essential feature of that 'nature' that is beloved by the sportsman. It is, indeed, the most noticeable effect of the sportsman's activity to keep nature in a state of chronic desolation by killing off all living things whose destruction he can compass.

Still, there is ground for the sportsman's claim that under the existing conventionalities his need of recreation and of contact with nature can best be satisfied by the course which he takes. Certain canons of good breeding have been imposed by the prescriptive example of a predatory leisure class in the past and have been somewhat painstakingly conserved by the usage of the latter-day representatives of that class; and these canons will not permit him, without blame, to seek contact with nature on other terms. From being an honourable employment handed down from the predatory culture as the highest form of everyday leisure, sports have come to be the only form of outdoor activity that has the full sanction of decorum. Among the proximate incentives to shooting and angling, then, may be the need of recreation and outdoor life. The remoter cause which imposes the necessity of seeking these objects under the cover of systematic slaughter is a prescription that can not be violated except at the risk of disrepute and consequent lesion to one's self-respect.

The case of other kinds of sport is somewhat similar. Of these, athletic games are the best example. Prescriptive usage with respect to what forms of activity, exercise, and recreation are permissible under the code of reputable living is of course present here also. Those who are addicted to athletic sports, or who admire them, set up the claim that these afford the best available means of recreation and of 'physical culture'. And prescriptive usage gives countenance to the claim. The canons of reputable living exclude from the scheme of life of the leisure class all activity that can not be classed as conspicuous leisure. And consequently they tend by prescription to exclude it also from the scheme of life of the community generally. At the same time purposeless physical exertion is tedious and distasteful beyond tolerance. As has been noticed in another connection, recourse is in such a case had to some form of activity which shall at least afford a colourable pretence of purpose, even if the object assigned be only a make-believe. Sports satisfy these requirements of substantial futility together with a colourable makebelieve of purpose. In addition to this they afford scope for emulation, and are attractive also on that account. In order to be decorous, an employment must conform to the leisure-class canon of reputable waste; at the same time all activity, in order to be persisted in as an habitual, even if only partial, expression of life, must conform to the generically human canon of efficiency for some serviceable objective end. The leisure-class canon demands strict and comprehensive futility; the instinct of workmanship demands purposeful action. The leisureclass canon of decorum acts slowly and pervasively, by a selective elimination of all substantially useful or purposeful modes of action from the accredited scheme of life; the instinct of workmanship acts impulsively and may be satisfied, provisionally, with a proximate purpose. It is only as the apprehended ulterior futility of a given line of action enters the reflective complex of consciousness as an element essentially alien to the normally purposeful trend of the life process that its disquieting and deterrent effect on the consciousness of the agent is wrought.

The individual's habits of thought make an organic complex, the trend of which is necessarily in the direction of serviceability to the life process. When it is attempted to assimilate systematic waste or futility, as an end in life, into this organic complex, there presently supervenes a revulsion. But this revulsion of the organism may be avoided if the attention can be confined to the proximate, unrefiected purpose of dexterous or emulative exertion. Sports-hunting, angling, athletic games, and the like-afford an exercise for dexterity and for the emulative ferocity and astuteness characteristic of predatory life. So long as the individual is but slightly gifted with reflection or with a sense of the ulterior trend of his actions-so long as his life is substantially a life of naive impulsive action-so long the immediate and unrefiected purposefulness of sports, in the way of an expression of dominance, will measurably satisfy his instinct of workmanship. This is especially true if his dominant impulses are the unreflecting emulative propensities of the predaceous temperament. At the same time the canons of decorum will commend sports to him as expressions of a pecuniarily blameless life. It is by meeting these two requirements, of ulterior wastefulness and proximate purposefulness, that any given employment holds its place as a traditional and habitual mode of decorous recreation. In the sense that other forms of recreation and exercise are morally impossible to persons of good breeding and delicate sensibilities, then, sports are the best available means of recreation under existing circum-stances.

But those members of respectable society who advocate athletic games commonly justify their attitude on this head to themselves and to their neighbours on the ground that these games serve as an invaluable means of development. They not only improve the contestant's physique, but it is commonly added that they also foster a manly spirit, both in the participants and in the spectators. Football is the particular game which will probably first occur to any one in this community when the question of the serviceability of athletic games is raised, as this form of athletic contest is at present uppermost in the mind of those who plead for or against games as a means of physical or moral salvation. This typical athletic sport may, therefore, serve to illustrate the bearing of athletics upon the development of the contestant's character and physique. It has been said, not inaptly, that the relation of football to physical culture is much the same as that of the bull-fight to agriculture. Serviceability for these lusory institutions requires sedulous training or breeding. The material used, whether brute or human, is subjected to careful selection and discipline, in order to secure and accentuate certain aptitudes and propensities which are characteristic of the ferine state, and which tend to obsolescence under domestication. This does not mean that the result in either case is an all-around and consistent rehabilitation of the ferine or barbarian habit of mind and body. The result is rather a onesided return to barbarism or to the ferœ natura-a rehabilitation and accentuation of those ferine traits which make for damage and desolation, without a corresponding development of the traits which would serve the individual's self-preservation and fulness of life in a ferine environment. The culture bestowed in football gives a product of exotic ferocity and cunning. It is a rehabilitation of the early barbarian temperament, together with a suppression of those details of temperament which, as seen from the standpoint of the social and economic exigencies, are the redeeming features of the savage character.

Conspicuous Uselessness of Education

During the recent past some tangible changes have taken place in the scope of college and university teaching. These changes have in the main consisted in a partial displacement of the humanities-those branches of learning which are conceived to make for the traditional 'culture', character, tastes, and ideals-by those more matter-of-fact branches which make for civic and industrial efficiency. To put the same thing in other words, those branches of knowledge which make for efficiency (ultimately productive efficiency) have gradually been gaining ground against those branches which make for a heightened consumption or a lowered industrial efficiency and for a type of character suited to the régime of status. In this adaptation of the scheme of instruction the higher schools have commonly been found on the conservative side; each step which they have taken in advance has been to some extent of the nature of a concession. The sciences have been intruded into the scholar's discipline from without, not to say from below. It is noticeable that the humanities which have so reluctantly yielded ground to the sciences are pretty uniformly adapted to shape the character of the student in accordance with a traditional self-centred scheme of consumption; a scheme of contemplation and enjoyment of the true, the beautiful, and the good, according to a conventional standard of propriety and excellence, the salient feature of which is leisure-otium cum dignitate. In language veiled by their own habituation to the archaic, decorous point of view, the spokesmen of the humanities have insisted upon the ideal embodied in the maxim, fruges consumere nati. This attitude should occasion no surprise in the case of schools which are shaped by and rest upon a leisureclass culture.

The professed grounds on which it has been sought, as far as might be, to maintain the received standards and methods of culture intact are likewise characteristic of the archaic temperament and of the leisure-class theory of life. The enjoyment and the bent derived from habitual contemplation of the life, ideals, speculations, and methods of consuming time and goods, in vogue among the leisure class of classical antiquity, for instance, is felt to be 'higher', 'nobler', 'worthier', than what results in these respects from a like fami-liarity with the everyday life and the knowledge and aspirations of commonplace humanity in a modem community. That learning the content of which is an unmitigated knowledge of latterday men and things is by comparison 'lower', 'base', 'ignoble' -one even hears the epithet 'sub-human' applied to this matter-of-fact knowledge of mankind and of everyday life.

This contention of the leisure-class spokesmen of the humanities seems to be substantially sound. In point of substantial fact, the gratification and the culture, or the spiritual attitude or habit of mind, resulting from an habitual contemplation of the anthropomorphism, clannishness, and leisurely self-complacency of the gentleman of an early day, or from a familiarity with the animistic superstitions and the exuberant truculence of the Homeric heroes, for instance, is, æsthetically considered, more legitimate than the corresponding results derived from a matter-of-fact knowledge of things and a contemplation of latter-day civic or workmanlike efficiency. There can be but little question that the firstnamed habits have the advantage in respect of æsthetic or honorific value, and therefore in respect of the 'worth' which is made the basis of award in the comparison. The content of the canons of taste, and more particularly of the canons of honour, is in the nature of things a resultant of the past life and circumstances of the race, transmitted to the later generation by inheritance or by tradition; and the fact that the protracted dominance of a predatory, leisure-class scheme of life has profoundly shaped the habit of mind and the point of view of the race in the past, is a sufficient basis for an æsthetically legitimate dominance of such a scheme of life in very much of what concerns matters of taste in the present. For the purpose in hand, canons of taste are race habits, acquired through a more or less protracted habituation to the approval or disapproval of the kind of things upon which a favourable or unfavourable judgment of taste is passed. Other things being equal, the longer and more unbroken the habituation, the more legitimate is the canon of taste in question. All this seems to be even truer of judgments regarding worth or honour than of judgments of taste generally.

But whatever may be the æsthetic legitimacy of the derogatory judgment passed on the newer learning by the spokesmen of the humanities, and however substantial may be the merits of the contention that the classic lore is worthier and results in a more truly human culture and character, it does not concern the question in hand., The question in hand is as to how far these branches of learning, and the point of view for which they stand in the educational system, help or hinder an efficient collective life under modem industrial circumstances-how far they further a more facile adaptation to the economic situation of to-day. The question is an economic, not an æsthetic one; and the leisure-class standards of learning which find expression in the deprecatory attitude of the higher schools towards matter-of-fact knowledge are, for the present purpose, to be valued from this point of view only. For this purpose the use of such epithets as 'noble', 'base', 'higher', 'lower', etc., is significant only as showing the animus and the point of view of the disputants; whether they contend for the worthiness of the new or of the old. All these epithets are honorific or humilific terms; that is to say, they are terms of invidious comparison, which in the last analysis fall under the category of the reputable or the disreputable; that is, they belong within the range of ideas that characterises the scheme of life of the régime of status; that is, they are in substance an expression of sportsmanship-of the predatory and animistic habit of mind; that is, they indicate an archaic point of view and theory of life, which may fit the predatory stage of culture and of economic organisation from which they have sprung, but which are, from the point of view of economic efficiency in the broader sense, disserviceable anachronisms.

The classics, and their position of prerogative in the scheme of education to which the higher seminaries of learning cling with such a fond predilection, serve to shape the intellectual attitude and lower the economic efficiency of the new learned generation. They do this not only by holding up an archaic ideal of manhood, but also by the discrimination which they inculcate with respect to the reputable and the disreputable in knowledge. This result is accomplished in two ways: (1) by inspiring an habitual aversion to what is merely useful, as contrasted with what is merely honorific in learning, and so shaping the tastes of the novice that he comes in good faith to find gratification of his tastes solely, or almost solely, in such exercise of the intellect as normally results in no industrial or social gain; and (2) by consuming the learner's time and effort in acquiring knowledge which is of no use, except in so far as this learning has by convention become incorporated into the sum of learning required of the scholar, and has thereby affected the terminology and diction employed in the useful branches of knowledge. Except for this terminological difficulty-which is itself a consequence of the vogue of the classics in the past-a knowledge of the ancient languages, for instance, would have no practical bearing for any scientist or any scholar not engaged on work primarily of a linguistic character. Of course all this has nothing to say as to the cultural value of the classics, nor is there any intention to disparage the discipline of the classics or the bent which their study gives to the student. That bent seems to be of an economically disserviceable kind, but this fact-somewhat notorious indeed-need disturb no one who has the good fortune to find comfort and strength in the classical lore. The fact that classical learning acts to derange the learner's workmanlike aptitudes should fall lightly upon the apprehension of those who hold workmanship of small account in comparison with the cultivation of decorous ideals:



Iam fides et pax et honos pudorque

Priscus et neglecta redire virtus

Audet.



Owing to the circumstance that this knowledge has become part of the elementary requirements in our system of education, the ability to use and to understand certain of the dead languages of southern Europe is not only gratifying to the person who finds occasion to parade his accomplishments in this respect, but the evidence of such knowledge serves at the same time to recommend any savant to his audience, both lay and learned. It is currently expected that a certain number of years shall have been spent in acquiring this substantially useless information, and its absence creates a presumption of hasty and precarious learning, as well as of a vulgar practicality that is equally obnoxious to the conventional standards of sound scholarship and intellectual force.

The case is analogous to what happens in the purchase of any article of consumption by a purchaser who is not an expert judge of materials or of workmanship. He makes his estimate of the value of the article chiefly on the ground of the apparent expensiveness of the finish of those decorative parts and features which have no immediate relation to the intrinsic usefulness of the article; the presumption being that some sort of illdefined proportion subsists between the substantial value of the article and the expense of adornment added in order to sell it. The presumption that there can ordinarily be no sound scholarship where a knowledge of the classics and humanities is wanting leads to a conspicuous waste of time and labour on the part of the general body of students in acquiring such knowledge. The conventional insistence on a modicum of conspicuous waste as an incident of all reputable scholarship has affected our canons of taste and of serviceability in matters of scholarship in much the same way as the same principle has influenced our judgment of the serviceability of manufactured goods.

It is true, since conspicuous consumption has gained more and more on conspicuous leisure as a means of repute, the acquisition of the dead languages is no longer so imperative a requirement as it once was, and its talismanic virtue as a voucher of scholarship has suffered a concomitant impairment. But while this is true, it is also true that the classics have scarcely lost in absolute value as a voucher of scholastic respectability, since for this purpose it is only necessary that the scholar should be able to put in evidence some learning which is conventionally recognised as evidence of wasted time; and the classics lend themselves with great facility to this use. Indeed, there can be little doubt that it is their utility as evidence of wasted time and effort, and hence of the pecuniary strength necessary in order to afford this waste, that has secured to the classics their position of prerogative in the scheme of the higher learning, and has led to their being esteemed the most honorific of all learning. They serve the decorative ends of leisure-class learning better than any other body of knowledge, and hence they are an effective means of reputability.

In this respect the classics have until lately had scarcely a rival. They still have no dangerous rival on the continent of Europe, but lately, since college athletics have won their way into a recognised standing as an accredited field of scholarly accomplishment, this latter branch of learning-if athletics may be freely classed as learning-has become a rival of the classics for the primacy in leisure-class education in American and English schools. Athletics have an obvious advantage over the classics for the purpose of leisure-class learning, since success as an athlete presumes, not only a waste of time, but also a waste of money, as well as the possession of certain highly unindustrial archaic traits of character and temperament. In the German universities the place of athletics and Greek-letter fraternities, as a leisure-class scholarly occupation, has in some measure been supplied by a skilled and graded inebriety and a perfunctory duelling.

The leisure class and its standards of virtue-archaism and waste-can scarcely have been concerned in the introduction of the classics into the scheme of the higher learning; but the tenacious retention of the classics by the higher schools, and the high degree of reputability which still attaches to them, are no doubt due to their conforming so closely to the requirements of archaism and waste.

'Classic' always carries this connotation of wasteful and archaic, whether it is used to denote the dead languages or the obsolete or obsolescent forms of thought and diction in the living language, or to denote other items of scholarly activity or apparatus to which it is applied with less aptness. So the archaic idiom of the English language is spoken of as 'classic' English. Its use is imperative in all speaking and writing upon serious topics, and a facile use of it lends dignity to even the most commonplace and trivial string of talk. The newest form of English diction is of course never written; the sense of that leisure-class propriety which requires archaism in speech is present even in the most illiterate or sensational writers in sufficient force to prevent such a lapse. On the other hand, the highest and most conventionalised style of archaic diction is-quite characteristically-properly employed only in communications between an anthropomorphic divinity and his subjects. Midway between these extremes lies the everyday speech of leisure-class conversation and literature.

Elegant diction, whether in writing or speaking, is an effective means of reputability. It is of moment to know with some precision what is the degree of archaism conventionally required in speaking on any given topic. Usage differs appreciably from the pulpit to the marketplace; the latter, as might be expected, admits the use of relatively new and effective words and turns of expression, even by fastidious persons. A discriminate avoidance of neologisms is honorific, not only because it argues that time has been wasted in acquiring the obsolescent habit of speech, but also as showing that the speaker has from infancy habitually associated with persons who have been familiar with the obsolescent idiom. It thereby goes to show his leisureclass antecedents. Great purity of speech is presumptive evidence of several successive lives spent in other than vulgarly useful occupations; although its evidence is by no means entirely conclusive to this point.

As felicitous an instance of futile classicism as can well be found, outside of the Far East, is the conventional spelling of the English language. A breach of the proprieties in spelling is extremely annoying and will discredit any writer in the eyes of all persons who are possessed of a developed sense of the true and beautiful. English orthography satisfies all the requirements of the canons of reputability under the law of conspicuous waste. It is archaic, cumbrous, and ineffective; its acquisition consumes much time and effort; failure to acquire it is easy of detection. Therefore it is the first and readiest test of reputability in learning, and conformity to its ritual is indispensable to a blameless scholastic life.

On this head of purity of speech, as at other points where a conventional usage rests on the canons of archaism and waste, the spokesmen for the usage instinctively take an apologetic attitude. It is contended, in substance, that a punctilious use of ancient and accredited locutions will serve to convey thought more adequately and more precisely than would the straight-forward use of the latest form of spoken English; whereas it is notorious that the ideas of to-day are effectively expressed in the slang of to-day. Classic speech has the honorific virtue of dignity; it commands attention and respect as being the accredited method of communication under the leisure-class scheme of life, because it carries a pointed suggestion of the industrial exemption of the speaker. The advantage of the accredited locutions lies in their reputability; they are reputable because they are cumbrous and out of date, and therefore argue waste of time and exemption from the use and the need of direct and forcible speech.

分册总目录

女权辩护

Mary Wollstonecraft A Vindication of the Rights of Woman

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企鹅口袋书系列·伟大的思想

女权辩护

(英汉双语)

[英]玛丽·沃斯通克拉夫特 著

陶 鑫 译









中国出版集团公司

中国对外翻译出版有限公司


图书在版编目(CIP)数据

女权辩护:英汉双语/(英)沃斯通克拉夫特著;陶鑫译.

—北京:中国对外翻译出版有限公司,2011.12

(企鹅口袋书系列·伟大的思想)

ISBN 978-7-5001-3320-9

Ⅰ.①女… Ⅱ.①沃… ②陶… Ⅲ.①英语—汉语—对照读物 ②女权运动—研究 Ⅳ.①H319.4:D

中国版本图书馆CIP数据核字(2011)第247437号


www.penguin.com

First published 1792

Published in Penguin Classics 1975

This extract published in Penguin Books 2004

Taken from the Penguin Classics edition of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman

edited by Miriam Brody

Set in Monotype Dante

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中国对外翻译出版有限公司与企鹅图书有限公司联合出版

中文目录

观念

《伟大的思想》中文版序

译者前言

作者前言

关于两性品格流行观点的讨论

再论关于两性品格的流行观点

关于使女人沦入堕落状态原因的探讨

各种关于良好声誉重要性的性别观念对道德的损害

社会上既定的不合理差别造成的有害影响

论国民教育

女人的无知导致的数例蠢行结束语:论女性习俗的变革必然期望带来的道德进步

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观 念

——《伟大的思想》代序

梁文道

每隔一段时间,媒体就喜欢评选一次“影响世界的X个人”或者“改变历史的X项发明”。然而,在我看来,几乎所有人类史上最重大的变革,首先都是一种观念的变革。

我们今天之所以会关注气候的暖化与生物多样性的保存,是因为我们看待地球的方式变了,我们比以前更加意识到人在自然中的位置,也更加了解自然其实是一个动态的系统。放弃了人类可以主宰地球的世界观,这就意味着我们接受了一个观念的变化。同样地,我们不再相信男人一出生就该主宰女人,甚至也不再认为男女之别是不可动摇的本质区分;这也是观念的变化。如果说环保运动和女权运动有任何影响的话,那些影响一定就是从大脑开始的。也不要只看好事,20世纪最惨绝人寰的浩劫最初也只不过是一些小小的观念,危险的观念。比如说一位德国人,他相信人类的进化必以“次等种族”的灭绝为代价……

这套丛书不叫“伟大的巨著”,是因为它们体积都不大,而且还有不少是抽取自某些名著的章节。可它们却全是伟大的观念,例如达尔文论天择,潘恩论常识,它们共同构成了人类的观念地图。从头看它们一遍,就是检视文明所走过的道路,从深处理解我们今天变成这个样子的原因。

也许你会发现其中有些陌生的名字,或者看起来没有那么“伟大”的篇章(譬如普鲁斯特追忆他的阅读时光),但你千万不要小看它们。因为真正重要、真正能够产生启蒙效果的观念往往具有跨界移动的能力,它会跨越时空,离开它原属的领域,在另一个世界产生意外的效果。就像马可·波罗在监狱里述说的异国图景,当时有谁料得到那些荒诞的故事会诱发出哥伦布的旅程呢?我也无法猜测,这套小书的读者里头会不会有下一个哥伦布,他将带着令人惊奇的观念航向自己的大海。

《伟大的思想》中文版序

企鹅《伟大的思想》丛书2004年开始出版。在英国,已付印80种,尚有20种计划出版。美国出版的丛书规模略小,德国的同类丛书规模更小一些。丛书销量已远远超过200万册,在全球很多人中间,尤其是学生当中,普及了哲学和政治学。中文版《伟大的思想》丛书的推出,迈出了新的一步,令人欢欣鼓舞。

推出这套丛书的目的是让读者再次与一些伟大的非小说类经典著作面对面地交流。太长时间以来,确定版本依据这样一个假设——读者在教室里学习这些著作,因此需要导读、详尽的注释、参考书目等。此类版本无疑非常有用,但我想,如果能够重建托马斯·潘恩《常识》或约翰·罗斯金《艺术与人生》初版时的环境,重新营造更具亲和力的氛围,那也是一件有意思的事。当时,读者除了原作者及其自身的理性思考外没有其他参照。

这样做有一定的缺点:每个作者的话难免有难解或不可解之处,一些重要的背景知识会缺失。例如,读者对亨利·梭罗创作时的情况毫无头绪,也不了解该书的接受情况及影响。不过,这样做的优点也很明显。最突出的优点是,作者的初衷又一次变得重要起来——托马斯·潘恩的愤怒、查尔斯·达尔文的灵光、塞内加的隐逸。这些作家在那么多国家影响了那么多人的生活,其影响不可估量,有的长达几个世纪,读他们书的乐趣罕有匹敌。没有亚当·斯密或阿图尔·叔本华,难以想象我们今天的世界。这些小书的创作年代已很久远,但其中的话已彻底改变了我们的政治学、经济学、智力生活、社会规划和宗教信仰。

《伟大的思想》丛书一直求新求变。地区不同,收录的作家也不同。在中国或美国,一些作家更受欢迎。英国《伟大的思想》收录的一些作家在其他地方则默默无闻。称其为“伟大的思想”,我们亦慎之又慎。思想之伟大,在于其影响之深远,而不意味着这些思想是“好”的,实际上一些书可列入“坏”思想之列。丛书中很多作家受到同一丛书其他作家的很大影响,例如,马塞尔·普鲁斯特承认受约翰·罗斯金影响很大,米歇尔·德·蒙田也承认深受塞内加影响,但其他作家彼此憎恨,如果发现他们被收入同一丛书,一定会气愤难平。不过,读者可自行决定这些思想是否合理。我们衷心希望,您能在阅读这些杰作中得到乐趣。

《伟大的思想》出版者

西蒙·温德尔

Introduction to the Chinese Editions of Great Ideas

Penguin's Great Ideas series began publication in 2004. In the UK we now have 80 copies in print with plans to publish a further 20. A somewhat smaller list is published in the USA and a related, even smaller series in Germany. The books have sold now well over two million copies and have popularized philosophy and politics for many people around the world — particularly students. The launch of a Chinese Great Ideas series is an extremely exciting new development.

The intention behind the series was to allow readers to be once more face to face with some of the great nonfiction classics. For too long the editions of these books were created on the assumption that you were studying them in the classroom and that the student needed an introduction, extensive notes, a bibliography and so on. While this sort of edition is of course extremely useful, I thought it would be interesting to recreate a more intimate feeling — to recreate the atmosphere in which, for example, Thomas Paine's Common Sense or John Ruskin's On Art and Life was first published — where the reader has no other guide than the original author and his or her own common sense.

This method has its severe disadvantages — there will inevitably be statements made by each author which are either hard or impossible to understand, some important context might be missing. For example the reader has no clue as to the conditions under which Henry Thoreau was writing his book and the reader cannot be aware of the book's reception or influence. The advantages however are very clear — most importantly the original intentions of the author become once more important. The sense of anger in Thomas Paine, of intellectual excitement in Charles Darwin, of resignation in Seneca — few things can be more thrilling than to read writers who have had such immeasurable influence on so many lives, sometimes for centuries, in many different countries. Our world would not make sense without Adam Smith or Arthur Schopenhauer — our politics, economics, intellectual lives, social planning, religious beliefs have all been fundamentally changed by the words in these little books, first written down long ago.

The Great Ideas series continues to change and evolve. In different parts of the world different writers would be included. In China or in the United States there are some writers who are liked much more than others. In the UK there are writers in the Great Ideas series who are ignored elsewhere. We have also been very careful to call the series Great Ideas — these ideas are great because they have been so enormously influential, but this does not mean that they are Good Ideas — indeed some of the books would probably qualify as Bad Ideas. Many of the writers in the series have been massively influenced by others in the series — for example Marcel Proust owned so much to John Ruskin, Michel de Montaigne to Seneca. But others hated each other and would be distressed to find themselves together in the same series! But readers can decide the validity of these ideas for themselves. We very much hope that you enjoy these remarkable books.

Simon Winder

Publisher

Great Ideas

译者前言

玛丽·沃斯通克拉夫特(1759—1797),出身于一个普通市民家庭,她的家庭生活很不幸福,父亲酗酒成性,母亲愚蠢无能。玛丽从小没有享受家庭的温暖和良好的家庭教育。她很早就自谋生路,做过小学教师、护理师和家庭女教师。艰辛的谋生之路磨炼了玛丽的意志,生活中男性和女性的各种不公现象激发了她写作的冲动。她一生写就了多篇小说和论文、一本旅行书简、一本法国大革命史、一本行为手册以及一本儿童文学。《女权辩护》(1792)是她最知名的作品。玛丽在这本书中表现出的超越普通女性的真知灼见,让她当之无愧地成为当代女性主义的先驱。

对普通大众——特别是女权主义者而言,沃斯通克拉夫特的一生要比她的作品更吸引人们的注意,这主要是由于她另类的生活方式。在与无政府主义运动的先驱者威廉·戈德温结婚之前,沃斯通克拉夫特还曾与两个男人有过两段不幸的爱情:其一是画家亨利希·菲斯利,其二是商人吉尔伯特·伊姆利。沃斯通克拉夫特与戈德温有一个女儿,即《弗兰肯斯坦》的作者玛丽·雪莱。38岁时,沃斯通克拉夫特死于产后并发症,遗留下几部未完成的手稿。

在沃斯通克拉夫特死后,戈德温出版了《〈女权辩护〉作者传》(1798),其中透露了她另类的生活方式。本为纪念妻子的戈德温,却在无意之间将她的名誉破坏长达一个世纪之久。但是,随着20世纪初女权主义运动的兴起,沃斯通克拉夫特对性别平等的提倡以及对传统女性特质的批评开始变得日益重要。如今,她已被视作是女权主义哲学家的鼻祖之一,而女权主义者们也经常会提到她的生活与作品。

在《女权辩护》中,她以各种实际生活中的鲜活事例,精辟地指出了女人温柔端庄的本质,并分析了致使男女不平等的各种陈规陋习。她指出社会上各种关于女性优点的意见造成了女性性格的软弱和无能,而女性的教育制度使女性处于一种“无知的奴隶式依附”状态。她主张女人应当以自己的理智赢得世人的敬重,而不是靠外表的装饰、性格的软弱博得男人的同情和爱慕。作为人类的女性应当享有与男性相同的教育权和其他基本权利,而不应被视作社会的装饰品或婚姻交易中的财产;而要想从根本上改善女人的品格和风尚,必须给予她们精神上的自由,培养她们的理性,让她们自由地思考,独立地履行家庭的责任,成为一个“人”。她的这些在当时看来“离经叛道”的观点却成为很多女性主义者奋斗的准则;即使在现代,当我们重温这位伟大的女性200多年前写下的文字时,仍然不得不惊叹于她敏锐的洞察力和深刻的思索。

作者前言

我带着焦虑关切的心情审视历史和观察世界之后,一种非常郁闷的悲愤感让我情绪十分低落;在我不得不承认,不仅造物主让人和人之间有巨大的差别,而且世界上发展至今的文明也是有失偏颇时,不由得长叹一声。我曾经翻阅过很多本讨论教育问题的书,也耐心观察过父母的教育方式和学校的管理模式,但是结果如何呢?——我坚信,造成我强烈谴责的不幸境遇的主要原因,是对我的女性同胞教育问题的忽视;我还坚信,特别是女人,由于一个轻率结论导致的各种综合因素共同作用,沦入软弱和悲惨的境地。事实上,女人的行为举止显然证明了她们的思想是不健康的;因为就像生长在过于肥沃土壤里的花朵一样,为了美丽牺牲了力量和用途;而那些鲜艳的花朵,令那些评头论足的观赏者感到心满意足之后,远在成熟期之前就凋谢在枝头上,无人问津了。我通过阅读论述教育问题的书籍,认为这种华而不实的现象起因之一是一套错误的教育体制,写这些书的男人与其说把女性当作人来看,不如说把女性当作女人来看。他们热切渴望将女性变成迷人的情妇,而不是深情的妻子和理性的母亲;女人的理智受到这种华而不实论调的蒙蔽太深,甚至现代社会的文明女性,除了极少数人之外,在应该拥有一种更为高尚的志向,并且通过自己的才能和品德赢得尊重的时候,却只是一门心思试图激发别人对她们的爱慕。

因此,在讨论女人权利和行为的专著中,那些致力于改善女人权利和行为的著作不应忽略,特别是有些著作根本不讳言,女人虚伪的优雅已经使她们意志薄弱;有才华的作家创作的教科书和那些比较轻浮的作品一样具有相同的倾向;按照真正伊斯兰教的习俗,女人被看作是一种附属品,而不是人类的一部分;人们用差强人意的理由夸大男人和女人的差别,这种夸大的差别将男人区别于野兽,并把一根自然的权杖交给一个软弱的人。

但是作为一个女人,我无意引导读者认为我有意热烈探讨这些关于女人品行和低劣地位等有争议的问题;但是既然这个话题出现在我的面前,我就不能避而不谈,否则我的主要论点就会遭到曲解,因此我要花一点时间简单论述我的观点。在自然界,女人大多体力上不如男人,这是显而易见的。这就是自然法则,而这条法则似乎并没有为了女人而被废除或取消。因此男人在体力上有一定的优势是不容置疑的,而且这是一种高贵的天赋特权!但是男人仍然不满足于这种天然的优越地位,他们竭力将女人的地位贬得更低,只是为了让女人变成一时诱人的玩物;但是女人沉溺于男人在肉欲支配下对她们表达的爱慕之情,不会努力在心中去追求一种永恒的兴趣,也不会尝试成为这些以和她们交往为消遣的同胞们的朋友。

我意识到了一个明显的推论。我到处都能听到反对女人男性化的呼声,但是哪里有这样的女人呢?如果男人如此疾呼只是为了打击女人打猎、射击和赌博的热情的话,我也会十分乐意加入男人的呐喊;但是如果是为了反对女人模仿,确切地说,获取男人的才能和性格的话,那么我想,那些以理性、冷静眼光看待女人的人会和我一样,希望女人日益男性化,因为这些才能和品德能够提升人类的品格,让女人成为更高尚的动物,从而让女人被广泛地称为人。

讨论至此,自然我们的话题就要一分为二。首先,我要以一种宏观的视角,将女人当作人来讨论,她们和男人一样,被神安放到这个世界上施展她们的才华;然后我要更加详细地探讨她们独特的职责。

我还希望避免犯一个很多作家都犯过的错误;因为目前女人接受的教育,其实是针对贵妇人的,如果我们不包括《桑德夫和莫顿》 [1] 里面一点零散的间接建议的话;但是我以更加坚定的语气告诉我的女同胞们,我将特别关注那些中产阶级的女人,因为她们似乎处在最自然的状态。也许华而不实、道德败坏和爱慕虚荣的种子一直都是大人物播撒的。软弱而做作的人以一种不成熟、不自然的状态,超越了女性同胞的正常需求和感情,败坏了道德基础,将腐化堕落散布到社会大众中!这些人作为人类的一个阶级,是最需要别人怜悯的;有钱人的教育会让她们变得浮华而无助,而因为不用履行那些能提升人类品格的责任,她们正在发展的心灵无法得到锻炼。她们活着只是为了享乐,这种生活方式令她们很快就只能提供无聊的享乐了。

但是我的目的是对社会不同阶层的人和不同阶层中女人的道德品格分别进行探讨,所以目前来看上述提示已经足够了。我只是指出了这个话题,因为我认为前言的精要就是对其所介绍的作品内容做一个大致的概括。

我希望我的女性同胞原谅,因为我把她们当作理智的人来看待,既不奉承她们迷人的魅力,也不认为她们处于一种永远也无法独立的幼稚状态。我真诚希望能指出什么是真正的尊严和人类的幸福。我希望说服女人努力争取身心两方面的力量,使她们相信:那些温柔的蜜语、敏感的心灵、细腻的情感和优雅的品位,都是软弱的同义词;而那些只配供人怜悯的人和爱情,很快就会成为人们鄙视的对象。

因此,我不愿意使用那些男人奉承我们或滋养我们奴隶般依赖性的甜言蜜语,我鄙视那些被认为是软弱女人特点的脆弱优雅的思维、精致细腻的情感和可爱顺服的行为,我希望指出品德比优雅更重要,我们追求的首要目标就是不论性别,培养人的品格,而所有的次要目标都应当用这个简单的标准来检验,这种追求是值得赞赏的。

这就是我计划的概述;如果我一想到这个问题就会感受到强烈的情感并以此坚决地表达我的信念的话,那么我的一部分读者必然也会感觉到我这样做是出于经验和思考。受到这个重大目标的激励,我就不屑于再推敲词语修饰文风了。我希望我的作品于人有益,真诚让我无法做作,因为我希望用论证的力量说服我的读者,而不是用华丽的词语令人炫目。我不会浪费时间咬文嚼字,更不会编造一些言不由衷的矫情的夸大之词。我将关注事情的本质,而不是玩文字游戏!另外,我非常热切地希望女人能成为社会上更受尊敬的成员,因此我将极力避免用那些从散文进入小说,又从小说进入日常书信和对话中的华丽辞藻。

这些信手拈来的夸张的漂亮言辞损坏了品位,并且造成了一种背离朴实真理的病态娇弱;而泛滥的虚伪感情和夸大的情调扼杀了内心的自然情感,让家庭生活变得无趣。而家庭本应承担教导一个理性的不朽灵魂为更崇高的事业而奋斗的责任,并为这个教导的过程提供乐趣。

目前妇女教育比以前更受关注,但是女人依然被看作是轻薄的人,遭到那些试图以讥讽或教育改善她们的作家的嘲弄和怜悯。应该承认,女人年轻的时候把大把的光阴都花在学习些许才艺上面,同时为了美貌的放荡观念和通过婚姻抬升自己地位(这是女人提升自己地位的唯一办法)的欲望而牺牲对身心的培养。这种欲望让女人变得跟牲畜一样,她们结婚之后,行为规范像孩童般幼稚:她们梳妆打扮,浓妆艳抹,她们还给造物主的创造物起诨名。这些软弱的人只配当作男人的性玩物!谁能指望她们明智地管理一个家庭,或者照顾自己带到这个世界上来的可怜的孩子呢?

既然如此,如果我们可以从女人目前的行为,从目前普遍流行的对享乐的嗜好(这种嗜好代替了伟大志向和能够提升心灵的高尚感情)公正地推断出以下结论:女人一直以来接受的教育和文明社会的体制加速了女人成为微不足道的欲望的对象——只不过是繁殖笨蛋的机器罢了!——如果指望女人有所成就却不培养她们的理智,这种行为让她们忽略了自己应尽的责任,在韶华逝去之后变成荒唐而无益的人;那么我认为,理性的男人就会因为我试图说服女人变得更加男性化、更加受尊重而原谅我。

其实“男性化”只不过是个唬人的字眼而已,永远不必担心女人会获得过多的勇气或坚毅,因为她们明显在体力方面不如男人,这让她们在生活的各个方面不得不对男人有一定的依赖;但是为什么要用那些认为品格有性别之分并使简单的真理和性欲的狂想混淆不清的偏见,使这种不平衡更加严重呢?

女人这种做作的软弱导致了一种压制他人的倾向,并且让她们变得狡猾(狡猾是力量天然的对手),她们装出一副令人鄙夷的幼稚模样,即使这样能激起性欲,却也损伤了尊严。事实上,女人被那些女性品质的错误观点贬得太低,以致我在做出以上主张的时候,并不想要做奇谈怪论。让男人变得更贞洁,更节制吧,如果女人没有因此而同等地变得更聪明,那么显而易见,女人的智力确实比较低劣。似乎不用强调我现在说的是女性整体。有很多女性比她们的男性亲属更通情达理;既然在世间那些争夺外部平衡的永恒斗争中总没有胜出的一方,那么,思想作为一种内在力量自然地也就有了更大重要性,有些女性在夫妻关系中无须贬低自己,因为智力永远处于统治地位。

注释

[1] 英国作家托马斯·戴所作的一本关于儿童教育的小说,桑德夫和莫顿是书中主人公。——译者注

关于两性品格流行观点的讨论

为了给男性专制寻找理由,确切说是借口,人们想出很多精致的言论,来证明两性在修身养性的时候,应当以培养完全不同的性格为目标;确切地说,女人不能拥有心智的力量,而这种力量恰是修得真正的美德所必需的。但是似乎上帝只给人类指明了一条通向美德和幸福的道路,即让人类拥有灵魂。

既然女人并不是短命的虚度年华者,那为何要让她们深陷无知还美其名曰天真呢?男人不是尖酸地挖苦我们任性的情欲和卑微的恶习,就是振振有词地抱怨我们的愚笨和善变。我会回应,看,这就是无知的必然结局!仅仅依傍偏见的思维必将永远多变;当这种偏见的思潮不受约束时,它将带着毁灭性的力量蔓延。有母亲以身作则,女人自小就明白,略微知晓一些人性的弱点、行事精明、性情温和、表面顺从和恪守凡庸礼节,就会得到男人的庇护。对于一个拥有美貌的女子来说,其他任何东西都不重要,因为她们生命中至少20年光阴可安享男人的保护。

弥尔顿 [1] 就是这样描写人类初始、脆弱的母亲 [2] 的;可是我还是不明白他说女人生当性情温柔、妩媚动人是什么意思,除非他真正以穆罕默德的口吻,意欲剥夺我们的灵魂,并暗示我们只不过是美貌和盲从的生物,在男人不能乘着思考的翅膀翱翔时取悦他们的感官。

那些劝告我们成为温顺家奴的人,多么粗野地侮辱了我们!例如他们经常热心地建议我们:要靠温柔顺从来取得支配权,这些言论多么愚蠢幼稚,一个堕落到用这种险恶手段取得支配权的人是多么渺小卑微——她是永生的人吗?“毫无疑问,”培根勋爵 [3] 说,“人类肉体上和野兽同列,如果他灵魂上不能和上帝同列,他就是低下卑微的东西!”男人试图通过让女人永远保持孩童般的幼稚来保证她们行为端正,在我看来,这是极其不明智的。卢梭希望男女两性都停止理性的探索,这似乎比较合乎情理。因为一旦男人品尝了智慧果 [4] ,女人必然也紧随其后;然而,她们的理智接受的培养并不健全,她们能得到的只能是有害的知识。

孩童应当天真,我赞成这点;但这个词用在男人或女人身上,就成了软弱的委婉说法。因为如果女人注定能够获得人类的种种美德,并且通过智慧获得坚贞的性格——这种性格是我们未来希望的最坚实的基础,那女人也必然有权面对光明之源泉,而不是被迫在微弱的星光下摸索前行。当然,弥尔顿和我的想法大相径庭;因为他只强调美貌的不可置疑的特权,虽然从下面两段诗中(我摘录下来以作对比),我们很难看出他思想的一致性。不过伟大的男人经常跟着他们的直觉犯这种矛盾的错误:



于是绝美的夏娃回答道:

我的主人,我一切由你差遣,

你的命令,我一概无条件服从;

这原本就是上帝的安排;

上帝为你立法,而你是我的准则:

不求甚解即女人最满意的知识和荣耀。



这些正是我曾对孩子们说过的论点,只是我还补充说,你们的理智正在发展,你们必须尊重我的意见,直到它成熟到一定阶段,——之后你们应当独立思考,一切完全依靠上帝……

因此在讨论女人的言谈举止时,我们应当摒弃那些关于身体的世俗言论,探寻我们应努力让她们成为什么样的人,以和上帝合作——如果这种说法不是太过分的话。

个人教育这个词目前还没有明确的定义,我对它的理解是:赋予孩子一种关注,使其见识增长,性情成形,学会控制蠢蠢欲动的情欲,并在身体成熟之前锻炼自己的理性思维;这样他们成年以后,就可以继续踏上思考和推理的重要征程,而不是从头开始。

为了避免误解,我必须声明,我不认为私人教育可以收到某些无端乐观的学者们声称的奇异效果。男人和女人一定会在很大程度上受到他们所在社会的舆论和行为规范的教育。每一个时代都有一股主流的舆论取向,似乎是为了赋予这个时代一种不变的特征。因此我们可以断定,除非社会构成发生变化,否则我们无法期待教育能带来什么改变。然而考虑到我当前的目的,我只要声明一点就够了:无论环境对个人的才能产生什么影响,每个人都可以通过运用理智成为有道德的人;因为只要有一个人生来具有邪恶的倾向,是真正的坏人,那么,还有什么可以阻止我们成为无神论者呢?或者如果我们崇拜一个神,那个神难道不是个魔鬼吗?

因此,我眼中最完备的教育就是对理智的锻炼,使人的品格和心灵得到最大限度的发展和培养。或者说教育是为了使个人获得能使其独立的优秀品德习惯。事实上,称呼那些并非通过独立思考而获得某些品质的人为高尚的人,是很荒唐的。这是卢梭描述男人的观点;我将其引申到女人,并坚信,她们之所以有越轨行为,是由于虚假的优雅,而非对男性品格的探求。但是她们对受到的帝王般的崇拜过于醉心,除非时代风貌发生改变,转而建立在更理性的基础上,否则也许无法说服她们,通过贬低自己所得的不合理权力其实是个祸害;或者让她们相信,必须回归本性,和男性站在平等的地位上才能保持纯洁爱情带来的宁静和满足。但我们必须等待这个时代的到来——也许要等到王公贵族们受到理智的启示后,推崇人的尊严而非幼稚状态,抛弃他们华而不实的世袭权;如果那时候女人还不放弃滥用美丽获得的为所欲为的权利——那她们确实证明了自己智慧上不及男人。

也许有人会指责我傲慢自大;但我仍然必须申明,我坚信:所有写过关于女性教育和行为举止这个话题的作家,从卢梭到格雷戈里博士 [5] ,都曾促使女人的性格更加虚伪和懦弱,否则她们不至于这样;也正因此,女人成了社会上更加无用的群体。我似乎可以更加温和地表达我的信念,但是我担心这样就成了虚伪的满腹牢骚,而不是强烈情感的真实表达,也无法展现我经过经验和反复思考得到的明确结论……所有那些在我看来有意侮辱人类一半的成员,并使女人牺牲所有坚贞品质以取悦于人的著作,我都将对其整体主旨予以反对。

但是,按照卢梭的逻辑,如果男人身体成熟之后,心智也在一定程度上获得了完善,为了保持男人和他妻子的一体性,做妻子的完全依赖丈夫的理智也许是有一定道理的;就像优雅的常青藤缠绕在支撑它的橡树上,构成力量和美貌相得益彰的整体。但是,天哪!丈夫们,以及他们的贤内助们,往往不过是大孩子,——哦,不,多亏了早年的放荡风流,这些丈夫连男子汉大丈夫的外形都没有,——正如让瞎子给瞎子带路,我们还需要上帝来告诉我们后果的严重性吗?

在如今这个腐败的社会状况下,有很多因素通过束缚女人智力、折磨她们的感官而奴役女人。这其中之一,也许是最有害的因素,莫过于女人做事毫无头绪。

做事有条不紊是非常重要的能力,男人从孩提时代就受过做事方法的训练,因此行事缜密,而女人一般接受的是杂乱不堪的教育,因此很难会像男人那样,注意到这个问题。这种漫不经心、毫无条理的瞎猜(还有什么其他的词,可以更好地形容这种丝毫不经过理智推敲,肆意运用凭借本能得到的常识的行为?)使女人缺乏对事物的总结归纳能力;因此她们重复着昨天做过的事情,仅仅因为昨天她们也做了这件事。

这种在早期对理智的忽略,产生的后果比我们想象的要严重得多;因为这些意志坚强的女人学到的少得可怜的知识,鉴于各种原因,不如男人的有条理,况且这些知识往往仅仅是通过对实际生活的观察得到的,她们很少会将个人观察的现象和通过假想抽象经验而得到的结论做一番比较。她们更多地是通过从属地位和处理家务而获得社会交往,因此她们学习的都是零碎的点滴知识;另外由于学习对她们来说基本上只是次要的事情,所以她们不会以持之以恒的热情钻研任何一门学问,而这种热情是使人才智焕发、头脑清醒的不可或缺的因素。在目前的社会状况下,男人需要学习一点儿知识来维持绅士身份,因此男孩们需要接受几年的教育。但是相对于锻炼理智,对于女人的教育更注重培养她们如何获得优雅的体态。女人因生育和恪守端庄的错误观念而精疲力竭,身体发育不良,无法展现某些优美的姿态。此外,她们年轻时没有通过竞争锻炼自己的才智;即使她们天资聪颖,由于没有从事过严肃的科学研究,这种天赋也很快因注重生活品质和衣着举止而渐渐消逝。她们一味追求结果和改进,从不追根溯源;那些规范行为的繁文缛节,其实只是简单原则的蹩脚替代品而已。

为了证明女性柔弱的外表是教育制度造成的,我们可以举军人的例子:他们和女人一样,在头脑还没有积累起知识和原则的时候就被送入社会。结果也是一样:他们从混乱的谈话中获得一点肤浅的知识,通过在社会上厮混见了些世面;人们经常将这种对风俗和习惯的了解,误认为是对人类情感的认识。但是这种随意观察得到的粗糙结论,从未经过理性的检验,也非通过比较理论和经验得来,能称得上是对人类情感的认识吗?士兵和女人一样,拘泥于那些微不足道的品德。若男女受的教育相同,两性之间还有什么区别呢?我现在看到的一切区别不过是由于男人拥有更多的自由,得以见更多世面罢了。

现在做一番政治评论也许有点偏离我要论述的主题;但是它是在我一系列思考中自然而然产生的,因此我不能避而不谈。

常备军中永远不可能有意志坚定、精力充沛的士兵;军队也许是纪律严明的机器,可是其中很少有热情奔放、才华横溢的军人;至于深刻的洞察力,我敢断言在军队中和在女人中一样,极为罕见。我认为原因是一样的。我们甚至可以更进一步断言,军人同样也特别注意外表,热爱跳舞、热闹场所、冒险和嘲弄别人。他们像美丽的女人一样,把阿谀奉承当作每天的主题;他们受教导要取悦于人,他们活着就是为了取悦于人。但是在两性对比中他们并未丧失优势的地位,因为人们仍然认为男人地位比女人优越。尽管除了我刚才所述以外,我们很难看到他们的优越性表现在哪里。

最大的不幸在于,他们在尚未进行道德修养之时就学会了一套表面的规矩;在未经过深思熟虑,对人类本性宏大理想的轮廓深入认识时就学会了人情世故。后果显而易见。满足于对一般人性的认识,他们很容易产生偏见;他们人云亦云,盲目地屈从权威。所以即使他们有点理智,那也不过是一种出于本能的一知半解,这种理解只能对行为方式做出判断,但是在深究表象之下的原因或者分析观点时,就派不上用场了。

这种评论对女性是否适用呢?不但适用,我们还可以把这个观点更引申一步,因为他们都是受害于文明社会里建立起来的不合理的差别,而失去了有利的地位。财富和世袭的荣耀,让人们认为女性一文不名,她们只是关注财产的多寡;游手好闲使社会上出现了一批既殷勤又粗暴的人,他们一边甘受情妇奴役,一边对自己的姐妹、妻子和女儿作威作福。确实,这样做只是为了让她们安守本分。拓展女人的心胸、锻炼她们的理智,就会结束盲目的服从;但是,掌权者需要这种盲目的服从,因此暴君和享乐主义者竭力将女性保持在蒙昧无知的状态是有道理的,因为暴君只需要奴隶,而享乐主义者只需要玩物。享乐主义者其实是危害最大的暴君;女人受到她们情人的欺骗,正如年幼的君主被侍臣玩弄,还梦想着自己在统治着他们。

现在我主要谈谈卢梭,因为他对索菲亚 [6] 性格的塑造无疑非常扣人心弦,虽然在我看来极不自然。但是我要抨击的不是她性格的上层结构,而是形成她性格的基础,即那些使她所接受的教育得以建立的原则。不仅如此,虽然我极为钦佩这位才华横溢作家的天赋,并且经常引用他的观点,但是在我读到他露骨撩人的奇谈怪论时,就丝毫感受不到钦佩之情,而代之以无尽的愤怒。他对美德的侮辱让我眉头紧蹙,他优美的文笔带给我的微笑也因此荡然无存,我丝毫不能满意。这就是那位因大力倡导美德而主张摒弃一切和平手段,简直要把我们带回古代接受斯巴达式严格训练的作家吗?这就是那位热衷于歌颂激情的有益抗争、优秀品性的辉煌胜利,以及光辉灵魂自由翱翔的作家吗?他描写他可心的人儿迷人的双脚和诱人的风姿时,这些伟大的情操多么苍白无力啊!但现在我暂且不谈这个问题,我不想严厉指责这种突然泛滥的自负感,我只想说,任何抱着善意态度观察社会的人一定会对普通男女的爱情满意,因为这种爱情既不会因柔情万种而变得高贵,也不会因共同的知识渴求而得到加强。日常的家庭琐事足以提供愉悦的谈资,天真的抚爱缓解了无须运用智力或大量思考的劳作带来的辛劳;然而这种平凡的幸福景象在我们心中激起的情感,难道不是爱怜多于尊重吗?——这种情感跟我们看到儿童玩耍或动物嬉戏时的感受一样;但是在我们想到那些功德非凡的人在苦难中依旧战斗不止时,我们不得不肃然起敬,我们的思绪就被带到另一个世界,这里,理性战胜了感性。

因此女人或是被视为有道德的人,或是被视为软弱到必须完全依赖男人的优秀方可生存下去的人。

让我们来分析一下这个问题。卢梭宣称女人永远都不应该把自己看成是独立的人,她必须受恐惧的支配,发挥她天生的狡猾的才能,变成一个卖弄风姿的奴仆,这样才能更加吸引男人,成为情欲的对象,当男人需要放松时成为他更亲密的伴侣。卢梭自认为从天性中为自己的观点找到论据,甚至更进一步,旁敲侧击地暗示:人类一切品德的基石,即真理和坚韧,培养起来应当有所限制,因为对于女人的性格来说,服从才应当是她们需要一丝不苟永远铭记在心的最重要的一课。

简直一派胡言!何时才能出现一位拥有足够智慧的伟人,将因傲慢和肉欲而笼罩在这个问题上的迷雾一扫而尽呢?虽然女人体质比不上男人,但她们的品质也一定和男人相同,即使可能程度有别,否则品德将成为一个相对的概念;因此她们的行为应当建立在和男人相同的原则基础上,并具有同样的目标。

女人作为男人的女儿、妻子和母亲,和男人有父女、夫妻和母子的关系,她们的道德品质可以通过履行这些简单责任的方式来判断;但她们努力的目标,即那个伟大的目标,应当是展示她们的才华,树立自觉的高尚品德。她们可以努力使自己的道路充满乐趣;但是她们应该和男人一样,永远对生活并不能给不朽的灵魂带来永恒的快乐这一点。我并不是暗示男人或女人应当沉迷于抽象的思考或模糊的观点中不能自拔,以致忘记了摆在他们面前的爱和责任,而这两者正是孕育生命成果的途径;相反,我极力推崇爱和责任,我甚至还主张,只有严肃认真地对待它们,才能从中获得最大的满足。

也许认为女人因男人而生这一流行观点来源于摩西 [7] 富有诗意的故事;但是据推测,真正认真考虑过这个问题的人当中只有极少数相信夏娃真是亚当的一根肋骨,因此这个推论肯定是不成立的;或者至此我们只能承认,这个看法说明,男人从远古时期开始,就发现用实力来征服伴侣对自己有利,干脆捏造事实证明女人应该乖乖把脖子伸到轭上,甘受压迫,因为她整个人就是为男人的方便和享乐而存在的。

不要妄作结论,认为我意图颠倒世间万物的顺序。我已经承认,从身体的构成来看,男人似乎受上帝青睐,注定要比女人获得更大程度的美德。我这是针对男人整体来说的;但是我实在找不到理由表明男人和女人的品德本质上有何不同。如果美德事实上只有一个永恒不变的标准,那么如何区分不同美德的性质呢?因此如果我的推导过程没有纰漏,我必定坚决主张:所谓的不同美德都指向同一个简单的方向,正如上帝是唯一的一样。

如此说来,我们不应当将狡猾和智慧对立起来,将琐碎的牵挂和重大的奋斗对立起来,将美其名曰文雅的索然无味的软弱和只有伟大抱负才能激发的坚韧意志对立起来。

有人会告诉我,如果女人拥有这些精神力量,就会失去很多独属于女人的魅力,并且可能会引用一位著名诗人的观点来驳斥我离经叛道的主张。因为蒲伯 [8] 曾以全体男性的名义说:



当她接触到我们憎恨的任何事物时,

我们的愤怒带来的后果将无可预料。



这个警句将男人和女人置于何种地位我不做评判,留待公正的人士去定夺。现在我只想说明,我实在不明白为何女人应当受制于爱情和淫欲,永远处于屈辱的地位,难道她们真的都应该下地狱?

我知道对爱情发表不敬言论,是对情操和美好感情的严重背叛;但是我只是想从理性而非感性的角度,说出简单的真理。企图说服世人放弃爱情,如同从塞万提斯 [9] 的作品中剔除堂·吉诃德一样,是不可能,也是违背常识的;但是努力抑制这种骚动的情欲,证明不应该允许它破坏较其更加优越的力量,或者任其篡夺理智的支配权,这种努力,也许是正当的。

年轻时代是男女沉迷于爱情的时期;但是在无忧无虑尽情享乐的时候,应当为日后生命更重要的阶段做准备,那时理性思考将代替感性妄为。但是卢梭和那些步其后尘的男性作家们都热心地谆谆教导人们,整个女性教育应当只有一个目标,即取悦于男人。

请允许我和那些对人性有所了解却支持这个观点的人理论一番。他们是否认为婚姻会消除生活中的习俗呢?一生都受教导要取悦于人的女人很快就会发现,她的魅力就像残阳余晖,逐渐消逝,过了盛夏光年,青春不再,在和丈夫朝夕相处时,她已然不能在丈夫心中激起一丝涟漪。到那时她还会有足够的天赋自寻慰藉,挖掘她潜在的才能吗?或者我们是不是更有理由相信,她们会试图与别的男人寻欢,并且因为得到新的情人而被激情冲昏了头脑,忘记了她的爱情和自尊遭受的屈辱?当丈夫不再是至爱的时候——这个时候必然会到来——她取悦于人的欲望就会消退,或者变成痛苦的源泉;那时,也许是所有感情中最转瞬即逝的爱情,就会被嫉妒或虚荣替代。

现在我要谈谈那些受到原则或偏见约束的女人。她们虽然对男女私通深恶痛绝,可是仍然希望别的男人对她们献殷勤,以此证明她们被残忍的丈夫冷落了;不然她们就会日复一日地幻想情投意合的夫妇享受的幸福,直到变得满腹牢骚,身心俱疲。由此看来,取悦于人的绝妙艺术怎么会是一项非学不可的技巧呢?它只对情妇有用罢了。对于贞洁的妻子和认真的母亲来说,这种技巧不过是为品德锦上添花的装饰,而丈夫的爱情不过是让她的工作更轻松、生活更幸福的慰藉。但是,无论她的丈夫是爱她还是冷落她,她首先应当为自己赢来尊重,而不是把所有的幸福寄托在一个和她拥有同样人性弱点的人身上。

尊敬的格雷戈里博士也犯了同样的错误。我尊重他的用心,但是完全不能赞同他那篇著名的《给女儿的赠言》。

他建议她们培养对衣着打扮的爱好,因为他断言打扮是女人天生的爱好。他和卢梭都经常使用“天生”这个含糊不清的词,我不明白他们是什么意思。也许他们会告诉我,先身体而存在的灵魂本身就是爱好打扮的,并且把这种爱好带到一个新的肉体中,我会似笑非笑地听着,正如在人们对所谓的内在优雅高谈阔论时,我也是这种反应。但是如果他仅仅指运用天赋的能力就能产生这种爱好,我不能苟同。这种爱好绝不是天生的,和男人狂妄的野心一样,是由对权力的奢望催生的。

格雷戈里的主张远不止这些;他甚至推崇弄虚作假,建议天真无邪的女孩子隐藏自己的真实情感,不要兴高采烈地舞蹈,因为这时她的脚步会因激动而随心所欲,而她的举止应当不失检点。按道理和常识来说,为什么女人不能承认她可以比别人多做一点锻炼呢?或者换句话说,不能承认她有健全的体魄;为什么要压制她天真活泼的天性,还在暗地里告诉她,男人会从她的一举一动中作出她意想不到的结论呢?随那些浪荡公子妄下结论去吧!我希望明智的母亲不要对女儿灌输这种不妥当的警告,而抑制了女孩子年轻时应有的率性。“言为心声”,确实如此;一个比所罗门更聪明的人曾经说过,人的心地应当纯洁,不拘小节;即使是内心充满邪恶的人,如果谨慎小心,也不难做到这点。

女人应当努力净化内心;但是,如果她们的理智没有接受训练,就会完全凭感情行事和娱乐;她们因缺乏高尚的追求而无法放下日常的无足轻重的虚荣,也不能抑制炽热的激情,这种激情如同一根芦苇,稍有风吹草动就会左右摇摆,在这样的情况下,她们的心灵能够纯洁吗?为了赢得一个有道德的男人的感情,有必要弄虚作假吗?上天让女人天生体质不如男人;但是,为了赢得丈夫的感情,一个做妻子的,当她在履行女儿、妻子和母亲责任的时候,已经通过思想和身体的双重锻炼保持了天生的体力和思想的健全,难道还必须降低身份,玩弄手段,伪装病态的孱弱,来保持丈夫对她的感情吗?软弱也许会让男人心生爱怜,满足男人自大的傲慢,但是一颗渴求并且理应受尊重的心灵不会满足于救世主般高傲的抚爱。宠爱代替不了夫妻之间的情谊。

我承认,在帝王的后宫里,这些卖弄风情的手段是必不可少的;因为必须要刺激享乐主义者的胃口,才能防止他情绪消沉,表现冷漠;但是女人就如此胸无大志,欣欣然以此为乐?难道她们就这样无精打采地在极度享乐和百无聊赖中虚度光阴,而不坚持去追求合理的快乐吗?难道她们不想去实践那些为人类赢得尊严的美德,而让自己得到重视吗?当然如果一个女人只是把生命消磨在穿着打扮上面,以此来取悦一个倦怠的男人,缓解他的顾虑,这样的女人是没有不朽灵魂的。生活中正经的工作完成后,男人当然愿意从她的微笑和小把戏中得到乐趣。

此外,注重加强体魄、锻炼心智的女人,通过经营家庭和修习各种美德,会成为她丈夫的朋友,而非卑微的依赖者;如果她因拥有这些高贵的品格而赢得了丈夫的赞赏,就会发现没有必要隐藏自己的感情,或者不自然地装出冷漠的样子,以激发丈夫的情欲。如果追溯历史,我们将会发现杰出的女性既不是女人中最美丽的,也不是最温柔的。

大自然,或者更确切点说,上帝,把万事万物安排得恰到好处;但是男人却总在试图捏造各种事情,破坏上帝的杰作。我现在指的是格雷戈里博士的那篇文章,他建议妻子永远不要让丈夫知道她的感受或爱情的程度。这种刺激肉欲的预防手段,既荒谬又无益。爱情究其本质来说,就是转瞬即逝的。试图找到使爱情永恒的秘诀,就如同寻找点金石或者万能药一样荒唐;即使找到这个秘诀,这也是对人类毫无裨益,甚至是有害的。一位精明的讽喻家说的很好:真爱难求,真正的友情更是难上加难。

这是一个自明的真理,没有什么高深的缘由,稍加研究便会明白。

爱情是人人皆有的情欲,在爱情中,偶然和感性代替了选择和理性,大多数人都体会过爱情;现在没有必要谈论那些比爱情高尚或低微的情感。这种感情,很自然地因悬念和困难而加强,使理智脱离常规,激情得到推崇;但是,婚姻的保障会允许爱情的狂热渐渐消退,达到一种有益的温度,只有那些不够明智的人,无法用冷静自然的友谊、相互尊重的信任代替盲目的赞美和肉欲的喜好,才会把这种健康平和的状态看成是索然无味的。

这是,也必须是,自然而然的趋势。爱情之后必定是友谊或冷淡。这种规律似乎和人类精神世界中普遍适用的支配规律完全一致。激情能够激发行动、启迪心灵;但是目的达到后,这种激情就会沦落为纯粹的性欲,变成个人和瞬时的满足,而满足的心也会安于享乐。当一个男人为争得王冠奋斗时,尚拥有一定美德;但当他成功加冕之后,往往都会变成骄奢的暴君;况且,如果男人在年老以后仍像情人般对待自己的妻子,这个年老昏聩的男人就是被幼稚的任性和溺爱的嫉妒所俘虏,他忽略了人生的重大责任,将本应施与孩子以取得他们的信任的爱抚,浪费在他的大孩子——妻子的身上。

为了履行人生的责任,一个家庭里的男女主人不应当继续热烈相爱,以便能够精力充沛地致力于塑造良好的道德品质。我的意思是不应当沉溺在那些扰乱社会规范的感情之中,把本来可以用在其他方面的心思用在彼此谈情说爱上。从未被一件事情吸引的心灵缺乏充沛的精力——而当它长期被某一事情吸引时,就会变得软弱。

错误的教育、狭隘的缺乏教养的心灵以及很多性别歧视,往往使女人比男人更忠贞不渝;但是现在,我暂时不讨论这个问题。我要进一步提出我的观点,并且声明,不幸福的婚姻往往对于家庭是有利的,而被冷落的妻子一般都是最优秀的母亲,我并不是故作悖论。如果女人的心胸再开阔一点,那么这一结论几乎就永远成了必然的结果;因为这看起来像是上天通常的安排:凡是我们从现时的享乐中得到的,都必须从生活的宝库——经验中去除;当我们摘下了鲜花,纵情于享乐之时,我们就不可能同时拥有辛勤耕耘和智慧浇灌带来的丰硕果实了。人生的道路在我们面前展开,我们必须选择向左走或向右走;一个穿梭于各种享乐场合虚度人生的人,不应当抱怨自己得不到智慧或可敬的品格。

让我们暂时假设灵魂不是永生的,人的存在只是为了活在当下——我认为我们有理由抱怨,爱情就如孩童一时兴起的爱好一样,渐渐会变得索然无味,令人生厌。让我们吃喝玩乐谈恋爱吧,因为明天我们就会死去,这种说法实际上是合情合理的,也是人生的道理;除了傻瓜,谁愿意脱离现实去追求那个短暂的幻影呢?但是,当我们因心智不可思议的奇妙力量而心生敬畏时,我们就不屑于将希望和思想局限在相对平庸的活动范围之内,这种活动只是表面上看起来光辉而重要,因为它是跟无限的前景和崇高的理想联系在一起的,那我们还有什么必要在为人处世中虚假做作,我们还有什么理由去触犯神圣真理至高无上的尊严,来保全摧毁道德根基的虚伪的幸福呢?为什么女人要被那套卖弄风情的技巧毒害了心灵,以迎合好色之徒呢?为什么要阻止爱情蜕变为友情,或者在缺乏建立友情的根本条件时,蜕变为富有同情心的柔情呢?将真实的心境展露出来吧,让理性来教导情欲,让它服从必然性;或者让崇高的对道德和知识的渴望把理智从情感中解脱出来,这些情感如果不加以控制,将使人生的杯子里装满更多的痛苦而非甘甜。

我指的并不是与天才相伴而生的浪漫感情,谁又能折断爱情的双翼呢?但是,这种伟大的情感只忠于感情,并且自由发展,人生中微不足道的享乐是无法与其比拟的。那些因持久而著称的感情往往都是不幸的。这种感情的发展是由于双方不在一起,并且它具有忧郁的本质。他们对想象中朦朦胧胧的美丽心存希冀;但是一旦得以接触熟悉之后,男女之间的爱慕就可能会转变为厌倦,或者至少是冷淡,并给想象力以空间,开始新一轮的追求。根据这种观点,卢梭非常有风度地使自己精神上的情妇,艾洛伊斯,在生活日渐乏味的时候爱上了圣普乐;但这也不足以证明爱情的不朽。

格雷戈里博士关于美好爱情的忠告也出于同样的考虑。他建议女人,如果她已下定决心要结婚,就不要轻易产生爱情。但是他把这种和他以往忠告完全一致的决定看作是粗俗的,尽管它会支配她们的行为,格雷戈里还是真诚劝诫他的女儿们隐藏这种决心,似乎拥有人性中正常的情欲是不美好的。

多么崇高的道德说教!那些审慎卑微的灵魂一定会赞成这种说教,他们无法将自己的眼界扩展到目前狭小的生活圈子以外。如果培养一个女人精神方面所有的能力,只是因为这些能力与她对男人的依赖有关;如果她一旦有了丈夫,就认为自己人生的目标已经达到,并且毫不羞耻地引以为荣,满足于这顶微不足道的王冠,如果她心甘情愿匍匐在男人脚下,从事的只是动物界以内的活动,那就随她去吧;但是,如果她是为了她的崇高事业而奋斗,并且富有前瞻性,那就让她培养理性,不必停下来思考她注定要结婚的丈夫拥有何种性格。她不应拘泥于眼前的享乐,要下定决心去培养那种能使理性的人变得高贵的品质,而这样一个鲁莽粗野的丈夫也许会打击她的趣味,但扰乱不了她平静的内心。她不会为了适应丈夫的种种缺点来改造自己的灵魂,她会容忍这些缺点;丈夫的性格对她来说绝不是修得美德的障碍,仅仅是考验而已。

如果格雷戈里博士的评论只是限定于对永恒爱情和志同道合感情的浪漫期待上,则他应该会想到,在想象力以牺牲理性为代价而依然活跃时,我们的经验就会驱除掉那些他的忠告永远也无法阻止我们去追求的东西。

我承认下面这种情况经常发生:有些女人抱着浪漫的不合实际的美好情感,她们整天无所事事,幻想着自己幸福地和丈夫生活在一起,她们的男人对她们炽热的爱慕与日俱增,直到永远。但是她们结婚了也许和单身的时候一样憔悴,与一个不称职的丈夫在一起或许比期待一个好男人更为郁闷。我主张,一种合理的教育,更确切地说,一个有教养的头脑,可以让女人过着有尊严的单身生活;但是说她应当放弃培养个人的情趣,避免遭受丈夫突然的破坏,这就未免有点本末倒置了。说实话,如果一个人不能超脱于人生的各种得失,如果他不能打开获得快乐的新源泉(这些快乐完全来源于个人思考的力量),那么还需要高尚的情趣做什么。有品位的人,无论单身还是已婚,无一例外都会厌恶那些对于缺乏洞察力的人们毫无触动力的事物。我们的观点当然不能依据这个结论得出;但是就整体的享乐而言,情趣可以被算作是幸福的一种吗?

问题是,情趣带来更多的是痛苦还是快乐?这个问题的答案将会决定格雷戈里博士的劝告是否合理:他规定了一种奴隶制度,并且他没有试图用纯粹理性推导出来的对人类普遍适用的规则去教育有道德的人,这表明他这种做法是多么荒谬而专横。

举止温柔、宽容忍耐和逆来顺受,都是非常亲切的神圣品质,在高尚的诗篇中他们都被颂扬为上帝的品德;或者可以说,除了上帝宽厚怜悯和欣然宽恕的品质外,没有一种表现上帝仁行的品德能够更好地维系人类的感情。从这个角度看,“温柔”确实是结合了庄严伟大和谦逊屈就的所有特征;但是,在温柔只是顺从依赖的行事方式,只是急需保护的软弱爱情的后盾时,它表现出的是多么不同的状态;在爱情需要默默承受伤害时,温柔是宽容忍耐;在鞭打之下还要强颜欢笑,丝毫不敢做出反击。这幅图像描绘的卑怯景象,就是一个所谓杰出女人的肖像,而这是以社会公认的女性优秀品质为依据的,那些徒有虚名的理论家们竟然把女性的优秀品质和人类的优秀品质区分开。否则,他们 [10] 最好还是把那根肋骨归还原位,再造出一个将男人和女人融于一体的有道德的人,并且不要忘了赋予这个人所有的“谦卑的魅力”。

我们不清楚女人在没有婚嫁的情况下是如何生存的。因为尽管道德家们达成一致,认为生命的演变似乎证明男人受到各种情境的磨炼,要更好地为未来做准备,而他们却经常一致教导女人只要为当下着想即可。基于此,温柔、顺从以及阿谀奉承的感情被看作是女性最重要的美德。有位作家不顾不容违抗的自然法则公然声称女人多愁善感就是男性化的表现。她生来就是男性的玩物,他的拨浪鼓,无论何时,在男人停止理性的探索需要娱乐时,它就必须在他的耳边当啷当啷地响。

确实,从广义上来说,劝人温柔和蔼是极为明智的。一个意志脆弱的人是应当努力追求温和的。但是在宽容忍耐过度,变成是非时颠倒时,就不是一种美德了;不管在伴侣身上看到这种品德是如何简单,这种伴侣将永远被视为低人一等,使人感到一种味同嚼蜡的温柔,并且很快变成轻蔑。再者,如果劝告真的能使那些天生朽木不可雕的人变得温柔,那么社会秩序的改良就会指日可待了;但是正如我们马上就可证明的那样,这种不分青红皂白的建议只会导致矫揉造作,在不断改进的道路上丢掷一块绊脚石,妨碍了性情的真正提高,女人牺牲了真正的美德换来的只是徒有表面的优雅,并没有得到什么好处,虽然就个人来说她们可能在短短几年内赢得帝王般的统治地位。

作为一个哲学家,我怀着愤怒的心情阅读了男人用来粉饰他们侮辱女性言辞的种种看似有理的言论;作为一个伦理学家,我想问诸如“美丽的不足”“可爱的弱点”这些奇怪的自相矛盾的联想到底是什么意思?假如只有一个道德标准,只有一种男人的原型,根据穆罕默德灵柩的世俗传说 [11] ,女人似乎命中注定就是介于人兽之间的生物;她们既不像野兽那样有万无一失的天性,也不被允许用理智的眼睛注视一个完美的榜样。她们是为爱而生,不应该以寻求别人的尊重为目的,否则她们就会因具有男性的特征而被主流社会排除在外。

我们不妨从另一个角度来看这个问题。顺从的、懒惰的女人就一定是最好的妻子吗?让我们的讨论局限于目前的状况,我们可以看看这些软弱的女人如何履行她们的责任。这些女人因为获得了一些表面的成绩,加深了流行的成见,她们仅仅是为了丈夫的幸福而努力吗?她们浑身散发的魅力仅仅是为了愉悦丈夫吗?自幼就受消极服从观念熏陶的女人拥有足够的品行来相夫教子吗?事实完全不是这样。通过翻阅女性历史,我不得不同意那位刻薄的讽刺家所言,认为女性是人类最软弱和受压迫最多的性别。历史除了揭示女人地位低下的特点之外,还告诉我们什么?而又有几个女人从高高在上的男人可恶的束缚中得到解脱呢?这种女人太少了,让我想到了关于牛顿的一个绝妙的猜想——牛顿大概是一个精灵,偶然投入人世。顺着这条思路往下走,我不由想到了那些超越了社会为女性制定的规定而走上了特别道路的杰出女性,本是男人的灵魂,却错误地投胎拥有了一副女性的皮囊。假如在谈论灵魂时还区分性别是不合理的,则女人处于劣势地位一定是因为身体构造和男人不同;或是上帝在捏土造人时,给的火候不一样。

正如我一如既往所坚持的那样,我避免将两性集体做任何直接的比较,或者根据目前的状况,坦率地承认女人不如男人,但是,我坚持认为男人使女人更加低劣,直到女人堕落到理性生物正常标准以下。让她们的才能有用武之地,她们的品德得以发展,然后再确定女性整体在知识领域应当占有的地位。再次声明,我不只是为那少数杰出的女人寻求地位。

我们凡夫俗子很难预测,如果废除使我们举步维艰的专制主义,人类的发现和发展将会达到何种高度;但是,如果道德能够拥有更坚实的基础,则我就无须拥有预知未来的天赋,就可以大胆预言女人要么成为男人的朋友,要么成为他们的奴隶。我们也就不会像现在这样,分不清她到底是一个有道德的人,还是介于人兽之间的生物。但是,如果那时看来她们和禽兽一样,造出来就是供男人使用,那么他就会让她们安于缰绳束缚之下,而不再用空洞的赞扬来嘲笑她们了;或者,如果那时事实证明女性是有理性的,那么男人也就不会仅为了满足他的肉欲而阻碍她们的发展。他不会再用各种辞令来诱惑女人使自己的理智盲目屈从于男人的控制。讨论妇女教育问题时,他就不会叫嚣女人永远不应该拥有运用理智的自由,也不会建议那些像他一样修习人类道德品质的人,去做一个狡猾虚伪的人。

如果道德有永恒的根基,那么真理必然只有一个。任何牺牲真正意义上的品德来谋求眼前利益的人,以及那些以这种处事方式视为己任的人,都只是为了当下而活,他们不能被称作负责任的人。

这就是为什么诗人创作下面这个诗句时应当摒弃他的嘲讽和不屑:



如果软弱的女人误入歧途,

那么名人们的责任比她们更大。



因为如果女人永远不运用自己的理智,永远不能独立,永远没有自己独立的思想,或者永远无法感受理性意志的尊严(理性意志只向上帝屈膝,并且常常忘记宇宙中除了它自己以及它热烈关注的完美模范之外,还包括其他东西),永远不去追求那些转化成美德时可以效仿的品质,尽管在程度上它会战胜那颗因其狂喜的心灵,那么毫无疑问,女人就被困在坚不可摧的命运锁链上,无法挣脱。

我不想给人留下虚张声势的印象,因此如果我说当理智能够让女人清醒思考,如果她们真的有能力像理性生物那样处事,那么就不要把她们当奴隶对待,或者,像对待禽兽那样对待女人,在人类利用它们的时候,让它们完全受人类理智的支配;而是应当培养她们的心智,给她们以一定的有益而高贵的原则上的约束,通过让她们感觉到上帝是唯一可以依赖的对象,来获得自觉的尊严。像教育男人一样教育她们服从自然规律,而不是为了让女人更讨男人欢心而硬给道德加以性别区分。

再说,如果经验证明她们的智力、坚韧和刚毅无法在程度上和男人比拟,那么也应该让她们的品德在性质上与男人相同,虽然女人试图追求与男人同等程度的品德是徒劳无益的;这样男人的优越性即使不会表现得更明显,也会同样地清晰。真理是一项简单的原则,不容篡改,应当对于两性同样适用。现在规范的社会秩序也不会被颠覆,因为那时女性仅仅拥有理性给她安排的地位,玩弄手段不能带来男女平等,更不可能使男人屈从于女人。

这些观点也许可以称之为乌托邦般的幻想。感谢上帝,他让这些理论在我的灵魂上留下深刻的印记,并赋予我足够的智慧,让我敢于运用我的理智,直到我仅仅依赖上帝来获得品德的提升,我抱着愤怒的态度来对待那些奴役女性的错误观念。

我把男人作为我的同类来爱戴;但是无论他的权力是真正属于他的还是从别处篡夺的,他都不能把它强加到我的头上,除非某个人的理智值得我尊重;即使是那样,我也是服从于理性,而不是人。事实上,一个负责任的人的行为必须受到他自己理智的支配,否则上帝的绝对地位从何而来呢?

我还有必要详述一下这些显而易见的真理,因为女性似乎已经被孤立起来;她们被剥夺了那些使人类受益的品德,却还被粉饰以各种虚伪的优雅,使她们能够在短期里行使点专制的特权。爱情在她们的心中代替了所有其他更高贵的感情,她们唯一的目标就是使自己更加美丽,吸引男人的爱慕而非激起别人的尊重;而这个低劣的欲望,正如绝对君主体制里的奴隶性一样,毁灭了品格的所有力量。自由是美德之母,如果女人因为自己本身的原因成为奴隶,没有权利呼吸振奋人心的自由空气,她们就一定会像旅居异地的人一样郁郁寡欢,被看作是天然的美丽缺陷。应当铭记,只有她们是有缺陷的。

关于女性受统治的论点同样适用于男人。多数人总是受到少数人的奴役;那些丝毫不能辨别人类优秀品质的怪物却残暴地欺压着成千上万的同胞。为何拥有卓越才能的人要遭受如此的侮辱呢?皇帝们从整体上来看,在能力和品德方面,都比不上从普通百姓中选出来的同等数目的那些人,这难道没有得到大家普遍的赞同吗?但是他们曾经并将继续享有人们的尊崇,这种尊敬何尝不是对理性的侮辱呢?把一个尚在世的人供奉为神的国家不止一个。男人为了安享眼前的快乐而向强势力量屈服;女人不过是做了同样的事情,因此除非我们能够证明一个卑躬屈膝地放弃人类应得权利的廷臣不配做一个有道德的人,否则无法说明因为女性一直处在被奴役的地位,所以她们本质上比男人低劣。

残暴的力量一直统治着我们的世界,政治科学仍处在襁褓中,这一点从哲学家在传授对人类最有利的知识时有所顾忌就可看出,而正是这种知识决定了两性的区别。

关于这个话题我不想做更深入的探讨,我只是想得出一个明显的结论:当合理的政治体制得以传播自由之时,整个人类,包括女人,就会变得更为理智和高尚。

注释

[1] 弥尔顿(John Milton, 1608—1674),英国杰出诗人、政论家、革命家,17世纪英国资产阶级革命参加者。——译者注

[2] 即夏娃,《圣经》中第一个女人。——译者注

[3] 培根(Francis Bacon, 1561—1626),英国杰出哲学家、科学家、历史学家。——译者注

[4] 参见《圣经·创世记》第二、三章。——译者注

[5] 格雷戈里博士(Dr. Gregory, 1724—1773),苏格兰有名的医学家,写有许多医学著作和一篇《给女儿的赠言》。——译者注

[6] 索菲亚(Sophia)是卢梭名著《爱弥儿》中的女主人公。——译者注

[7] 摩西,《圣经》故事中古代犹太人的领袖。——译者注

[8] 蒲伯(Alexander Pope, 1688—1744),18世纪英国启蒙运动时期著名诗人。——译者注

[9] 塞万提斯(Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, 1547—1616),西班牙伟大作家。堂·吉诃德是其名著《堂·吉诃德》中的主人公。——译者注

[10] 参看卢梭和史韦登伯格的著作。——译者注

[11] 指伊斯兰教徒死后,送葬时女人不能扶灵柩的风俗。——译者注