26 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. \ OL. XXV. No. 627 



much as might have been anticipated. One 

 reason for this result is doubtless found in 

 the fact that the losses were not relative. 

 Had a single individual found himself sud- 

 denly reduced from a palace to a tent, his 

 sense of loss and discomfiture would have 

 been great. He could no longer return 

 social entertainment among his former as- 

 sociates; he would feel 'out of it' and envy 

 would gnaw at his breast. But after the 

 San Francisco catastrophe there was little 

 place for envy; all were in the same boat. 

 There was no relative loss, there was only 

 the absolute loss of creature comforts, and 

 strange as it may seem to one who has not 

 considered it, the absolute loss is the smaller 

 of the two. 



It is hard to overestimate the tax which 

 is laid upon society through social racing. 

 We are not conscious of this weight, be- 

 cause, like the weight of the atmosphere, 

 it is always pressing upon us. The New 

 York business man buys a silk hat as a 

 matter of course. He does not think of its 

 cost as a tax laid on him by society. He is 

 satisfied because the hat fills a want, and 

 he does not consider how that want orig- 

 inated. It is only when the tax varies by 

 change of place, just as when atmospheric 

 pressure varies by ascending a mountain, 

 that he is at all aware of its existence. If 

 he removes to a smaller town where social 

 racing is less intense and the leaders in the 

 race are unable to set so high a pace, he 

 finds the tall hat no longer de rigueur. He 

 drops off this and numerous other expenses 

 and feels himself that much better off. A 

 gentleman recently refused a salary of 

 $7,000 in New York, preferring $4,000 in 

 a smaller town, feeling that he could buy 

 no more real satisfaction with the former 

 than with the latter. The extra $3,000 

 meant simply that it would cost more to 

 keep up with his neighbors. 



The burden of social racing is laid not 

 only on the rich but upon all classes. 



A milliner in New Haven recently thought 

 to avoid competing with existing fashion- 

 able millinery establishments by catering 

 to the trade of shop girls. To his surprise, 

 he found that the tyranny of fashion 

 was quite as strong among them. He at- 

 tempted to put on sale a large number 

 of $5 and $6 hats, but found great diffi- 

 culty in disposing of them, whereas the 

 few $15 and $16 hats met with a very ready 

 sale. The shop girls wanted these hats to 

 'be in the swim.' Recently in France a 

 whole family committed suicide because 

 they had lost the capital which they con- 

 sidered necessary to keep their social posi- 

 tion. 



Many ingenious arguments have been 

 made to justify luxury and in some of them 

 there may lie truth. The fact that luxuri- 

 ous expenditure can be so readily cut down 

 in hard times provides a sort of buffer 

 against want and famine. The relations of 

 luxury to the growth of population deserve 

 careful study. But whatever the indirect 

 benefits of luxury, certain it is that it forms 

 a tax upon society, and a heavy one. It 

 seems also true that where luxury is great- 

 est civilization decays. 



Were there more space we might discuss 

 remedies for this social racing ; but we must 

 content ourselves with merely describing 

 the phenomenon. It exemplifies the man- 

 ner in which the self-seeking of each may 

 create a burden for all. 



From this and the other examples 

 which have been reviewed we see that 

 the mechanics of individualism is not so 

 simple as the individualists have assumed. 

 The old individualism requires two cor- 

 rections: first, the individual may often 

 be interfered with in his own interest, be- 

 cause either of his ignorance or his lack 

 of self-control; secondly, even when an in- 

 dividual can be trusted to follow his own 

 best interests, it can not be assumed that 

 he will thereby best serve the interests of 



