used for delight (as horses for racing), and such
like, form property of this class; to which the term 'luxury,' or
'luxuries,' ought exclusively to belong.

Respecting which we have to note, first, that all such property is of
doubtful advantage even to its possessor. Furniture tempting to
indolence, sweet odours, and luscious food, are more or less injurious
to health: while jewels, liveries, and other such common belongings of
wealthy people, certainly convey no pleasure to their owners
proportionate to their cost.

Farther, such property, for the most part, perishes in the using. Jewels
form a great exception--but rich food, fine dresses, horses and
carriages, are consumed by the owner's use. It ought much oftener to be
brought to the notice of rich men what sums of interest of money they
are paying towards the close of their lives, for luxuries consumed in
the middle of them. It would be very interesting, for instance, to know
the exact sum which the money spent in London for ices, at its desserts
and balls, during the last twenty years, had it been saved and put out
at compound interest, would at this moment have furnished for useful
purposes.

Also, in most cases, the enjoyment of such property is wholly selfish,
and limited to its possessor. Splendid dress and equipage, however, when
so arranged as to produce real beauty of effect, may often be rather a
generous than a selfish channel of expenditure. They will, however,
necessarily in such cases involve some of the arts of design; and
therefore take their place in a higher category than that of luxuries
merely.

147. (4) The fourth kind of property is that which bestows intellectual
or emotional pleasure, consisting of land set apart for purposes of
delight more than for agriculture, of books, works of art, and objects
of natural history.

It is, of course, impossible to fix an accurate limit between property
of the last class and of this class, since things which are a mere
luxury to one person are a means of intellectual occupation to another.
Flowers in a London ball-room are a luxury; in a botanical garden, a
delight of the intellect; and in their native fields, both; while the
most noble works of art are continually made material of vulgar luxury
or of criminal pride; but, when rightly used, property of this fourth
class is the only kind which deserves the name of _real_ property, it is
the only kind which a man can truly be said to 'possess.' What