degree for the barbarian stage of culture. During the predatory
culture labour comes to be associated in men's habits of thought
with weakness and subjection to a master. It is therefore a mark
of inferiority, and therefore comes to be accounted unworthy of
man in his best estate. By virtue of this tradition labour is
felt to be debasing, and this tradition has never died out. On
the contrary, with the advance of social differentiation it has
acquired the axiomatic force due to ancient and unquestioned
prescription.

In order to gain and to hold the esteem of men it is not
sufficient merely to possess wealth or power. The wealth or power
must be put in evidence, for esteem is awarded only on evidence.
And not only does the evidence of wealth serve to impress one's
importance on others and to keep their sense of his importance
alive and alert, but it is of scarcely less use in building up
and preserving one's self-complacency. In all but the lowest
stages of culture the normally constituted man is comforted and
upheld in his self-respect by "decent surroundings" and by
exemption from "menial offices". Enforced departure from his
habitual standard of decency, either in the paraphernalia of life
or in the kind and amount of his everyday activity, is felt to be
a slight upon his human dignity, even apart from all conscious
consideration of the approval or disapproval of his fellows.

The archaic theoretical distinction between the base and the
honourable in the manner of a man's life retains very much of its
ancient force even today. So much so that there are few of the
better class who are no possessed of an instinctive repugnance
for the vulgar forms of labour. We have a realising sense of