o diminish luxury,
or even abolish it altogether.

There is unquestionably much truth in this train of thought. But the
conclusion at which it arrives is refuted by an argument possessing
this advantage over it--that it is confirmed by the testimony of
experience. A certain amount of work is devoted to purposes of luxury.
What the human race loses in this way in the _muscular power_ which
would otherwise be available for the necessities of existence is
gradually made up to it a thousandfold by the _nervous power_, which,
in a chemical sense, is thereby released. And since the intelligence
and sensibility which are thus promoted are on a higher level than the
muscular irritability which they supplant, so the achievements of mind
exceed those of the body a thousandfold. One wise counsel is worth the
work of many hands:

[Greek: Hos en sophon bouleuma tas pollon cheiras nika.]

A nation of nothing but peasants would do little in the way of
discovery and invention; but idle hands make active heads. Science and
the Arts are themselves the children of luxury, and they discharge
their debt to it. The work which they do is to perfect technology in
all its branches, mechanical, chemical and physical; an art which in
our days has brought machinery to a pitch never dreamt of before, and
in particular has, by steam and electricity, accomplished things the
like of which would, in earlier ages, have been ascribed to the agency
of the devil. In manufactures of all kinds, and to some extent in
agriculture, machines now do a thousand times more than could ever
have been done by the hands of all the well-to-do, educated, and
professional classes, and could ever have been attained if all luxury
had been abolished and every one had returned to the life of a
peasant. It is by no means the rich alone, but all classes, who derive
benefit from these industries. Things which in former days hardly
any one could afford are now cheap and abundant, and even the lowest
classes are much better off in point of comfort. In the Middle Ages a
King of England once borrowed a pair of silk stockings from one of his
lords, so that he might wear them in giving an audience to the French
ambassador. Even Queen Elizabeth was greatly pleased and astonished to
receive a pair as a New Year's present; to-day every shopman has them.
Fifty years ago ladies wore the kind of calico gowns which servants
wear now. If mechanical science continues to progress at the sa