Bossuet treats this point in his "Traité de la Concupiscence" in language of great force: "The body," he says, "humbles the sublimity of our thoughts, and attaches us, who ought to breathe of heaven, to the earth. . . . Why," he continues, "do you turn your necessities into vanity? You need a house as a defense against injury from the weather—it is a weakness. You need food so that you can repair your forces, which are wasting away at every moment—another weakness. You need a bed where you can rest in your weariness and give yourself up to a sleep that chains and overwhelms your reason—another deplorable weakness. You make of all these witnesses and monuments of your weakness a spectacle for your vanity, and it seems as if you wished to triumph with the display of the infirmities that environ you on every side." Bossuet, it may be, carries the doctrine of renunciation to asceticism, but is he not right in the main? Is not every one of our needs a weakness, a subjection, a temptation to sacrifice the good and the just to sensuality? Dignity of bearing, pride in conduct, fidelity to opinion, often depend on simplicity in life. The fewer wants one has, the freer will he be to do whatever duty commands, and the less will he have in important crises to listen to the suggestions of cupidity.
The opinion that luxurious expenditure promotes the prosperity of the people is an error of the most pernicious character. Those who indulge in superfluities imagine that they are doing a service to the working people, and governing bodies, sharing in the delusion, sometimes grant special appropriations to induce certain functionaries to set the example of costly outlays. The most elementary notions of political economy should show this idea to be false. The progress of industry depends on-the increase of capital, and capital grows with saving. Luxury does not promote the increase of wages, but opposes it. Wages can only rise when capital increases faster than the number of workmen, or, as Cobden says, when two masters are running after one workman. Now, in order that this may take place, each of the competing employers must have accumulated a capital by saving. It is thus saving, not superfluous expenditure, that permits the creation of new fabrics and the employment of more workmen. In very rich countries, indeed, luxury does not prevent the increase of capital, because the incomes are sufficient there to answer for both purposes. Those who save are found in those countries along with those who spend, and the possessor of a large income may easily indulge some of his fancies and still save considerable sums. The immense surplus revenues of England are employed in the creation of new enterprises at home and abroad; but, if thrift were more general in that land, its productive capital would be still more largely increased and more widely distributed.
It is claimed, as a thing that is admitted by every one, that luxury stimulates trade. J. B. Say shows up this doctrine with the story of
