Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 9.djvu/560

 542 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

moneybags, youths swarm about the unattractive heiress, judges take bribes, experts sell their opinions to the highest bidder, and genius champions the cause it does not believe in, wealth is rated high.

The fluctuations in the market where spiritual goods are sac- rificed for material goods are commonly supposed to originate on the side of the higher goods. The material wants, it is reasoned, partake of the stability of the organism itself. It is the aspirations for the good, the true, and the beautiful that are variable.

This interpretation is probably wrong. Usually it is the esteem of wealth that fluctuates and not the esteem of health, or liberty, or honor. These are fundamentals and therefore rela- tively stable. Wantonness, sycophancy, and subserviency vio- late personal instincts. Hypocrisy, fraud, and espionage outrage natural feelings and come about as hard one age as another. For each race the loathing of them is nearly a constant, varying little from fathers to sons.

In fact, we do not need to explain the zigzag course of the market for spiritual goods by assuming a shifting in the stress of human wants. Since wealth is a means, the importance of wealth must constantly fluctuate because of changes in the power of material goods to gratify desire.

These result from changes in technique, in custom, or in opinion.

Thus the introduction of perfumes and spices gave new sen- suous gratifications, spirituous liquors provided a short-cut to social pleasure, armor opened a way to security, the breaking of the horse to saddle provided a form of dignified locomotion. The coming in of cattle enabled heads of kine to be trophies as well as scalp-locks and captives. The discovery of medicaments gave new weapons against disease. The origination of art products provided new embodiments of beauty. The art of embalming met in a way the longing for immortality. Memorial tablets, urns, and monuments offered themselves to the same need. Since by exchange any good may be converted into any other, each of these cases added to the desirability of wealth- in-general.