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 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 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 leisure-class 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 colorable 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