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 know¬ ledge 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 know¬ ledge.
The conventional insistence on a modicum of
conspicuous waste as an incident of all reputable schol¬ arship has affected our canons of taste and of service¬ ability 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 suf¬ fered 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 respecta¬ bility, 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
