Of course for the intellectual worker of any sort, Grub Street has always been in the background, and a teacher, writer, or artist is probably further removed from the fear of starvation and the gutter today than perhaps ever before. It may also be conceded that the intellectuals should lead the way in renunciation and a sane ordering of life. But it must be remembered that in America owing to mass mores the individual (with his family) is infinitely less free to lead his own life in his own way and yet retain social contacts with others than he is in almost any country in Europe. To a considerable extent, it is only after he has conformed to the material American standards that his real spiritual freedom and influence in personal relationships, begin. Moreover, whereas in Europe one can both preach[Pg 191] and practise renunciation of the material for the sake of the spiritual, the doctrine in this country is considered un-American, and if carried out by many would obviously bring the whole system of mass production crashing about our ears. This is readily understood by the business leaders, who are the real heroes and ideals of the people. The last thing in the world that they want either preached or practised is the simple life. The intellectual here, therefore, who is himself quite content to live that life and do his creative work without any thought of competing for rewards with the business man, finds solidly aligned against such a scheme of living not only the mass production wage scales which make the cost of almost any decent living prohibitive, but also the opinion of a spiritually unawakened public singularly bent upon forcing conformity to its own standards, and the opinion of the interested leaders of the public, the business men whose own profits now depend upon the public’s becoming more and more materialistic. The gigantic powers of manufacturing now in existence require for their profitable exploitation that the public shall be made steadily to develop new wants, wants that can be satisfied only by manufactured articles. Hoover and others may prate all they like about the concurrent need of an intellectual and spiritual life, but how is that life to develop if people are to be made to use their whole energies in satisfying new wants on the material plane? Yet if, on the one hand, they do not so grow, and, on the other, the intellectual classes become steadily more pinched between the two classes benefiting by mass production,—the owners above setting ever higher standards of living and the operatives below[Pg 192] pressing steadily past them in an orgy of material well-being,—what will become of the intellectuals and how long will they continue to struggle and deny themselves, and have their wives do the laundry, in a civilization which will more and more look down upon their lack of earning power and their declining economic and social status? FOOTNOTES: