It also appears
that this habit persists with greatest tenacity among those
classes in the modern communities whose everyday life is most
remote from the mechanical processes of industry and which are
the most conservative also in other respects; while for those
classes that are habitually in immediate contact with modern
industrial processes, and whose habits of thought are therefore
exposed to the constraining force of technological necessities,
that animistic interpretation of phenomena and that respect of
persons on which devout observance proceeds are in process of
obsolescence. And also -- as bearing especially on the present
discussion -- it appears that the devout habit to some extent
progressively gains in scope and elaboration among those classes
in the modern communities to whom wealth and leisure accrue in
the most pronounced degree. In this as in other relations, the
institution of a leisure class acts to conserve, and even to
rehabilitate, that archaic type of human nature and those
elements of the archaic culture which the industrial evolution of
society in its later stages acts to eliminate.
Chapter Thirteen
Survivals of the Non-Invidious Interests
In an increasing proportion as time goes on, the
anthropomorphic cult, with its code of devout observations,
suffers a progressive disintegration through the stress of
economic exigencies and the decay of the system of status.
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