The casual sequence which makes up the subject matter of
science is not visible from this point of view. Neither does good
repute attach to knowledge of facts that are vulgarly useful.
Hence it should appear probable that the interest of the
invidious comparison with respect to pecuniary or other honorific
merit should occupy the attention of the leisure class, to the
neglect of the cognitive interest. Where this latter interest
asserts itself it should commonly be diverted to fields of
speculation or investigation which are reputable and futile,
rather than to the quest of scientific knowledge. Such indeed has
been the history of priestly and leisure-class learning so long
as no considerable body of systematized knowledge had been
intruded into the scholastic discipline from an extra-scholastic
source. But since the relation of mastery and subservience is
ceasing to be the dominant and formative factor in the
community's life process, other features of the life process and
other points of view are forcing themselves upon the scholars.
The true-bred gentleman of leisure should, and does, see the
world from the point of view of the personal relation; and the
cognitive interest, so far as it asserts itself in him, should
seek to systematize phenomena on this basis.
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