Fencing Bear at Prayer

"It appears, then, that the devout habit of mind attains its best development under a relatively archaic culture; the term 'devout' being of course here used in its anthropological sense simply, and not as implying anything with respect to the spiritual attitude so characterised, beyond the fact of a proneness to devout observances. It appears also that this devout attitude marks a type of human nature which is more in consonance with the predatory mode of life than with the later-developed, more consistently and organically industrial life process of the community. It is in large measure an expression of the archaic habitual sense of personal status,--the relation of mastery and subservience,--and it therefore fits into the industrial scheme of the predatory and the quasi-peaceable culture, but does not fit into the industrial scheme of the present. It also appears that this habit persists with greatest tenacity among those classes in the modern communities whose every...

"The dog has advantages [as compared with cats] 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 aesthetic 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 expe...

It is, I suppose, a comfort in a sort of roundabout way. According to Thorstein Veblen 's theory of the leisure class , pretty much everything that I do--reading or writing books, learning dead languages, having a dog , practicing yoga or fencing, being an intellectual--is a form of conspicuous consumption, i.e. "wasteful," "not serving human life or human well-being on the whole," taking up the time that, if I were actually economically productive, would be involved in growing food or making clothes or building buildings. Of course, thanks to the time that I spend in such conspicuous leisure, demonstrating thereby that I am not obliged to spend my time providing for the essentials of my bodily existence, I accrue social status (such as it is) and spiritual fulfillment ("spiritual" in the sense of everything other than bodily), but (by Veblen's definitions) it does mean that I am never, in fact, being anything other than parasitic on all those wh...