gives added weight and reach to the conservative
influence of that class. It makes it incumbent upon all reputable people
to follow their lead. So that, by virtue of its high position as the
avatar of good form, the wealthier class comes to exert a retarding
influence upon social development far in excess of that which the
simple numerical strength of the class would assign it. Its prescriptive
example acts to greatly stiffen the resistance of all other classes
against any innovation, and to fix men's affections upon the good
institutions handed down from an earlier generation. There is a second
way in which the influence of the leisure class acts in the same
direction, so far as concerns hindrance to the adoption of a
conventional scheme of life more in accord with the exigencies of
the time. This second method of upper-class guidance is not in strict
consistency to be brought under the same category as the instinctive
conservatism and aversion to new modes of thought just spoken of; but
it may as well be dealt with here, since it has at least this much
in common with the conservative habit of mind that it acts to retard
innovation and the growth of social structure. The code of proprieties,
conventionalities, and usages in vogue at any given time and among any
given people has more or less of the character of an organic whole;
so that any appreciable change in one point of the scheme involves
something of a change or readjustment at other points also, if not
a reorganization all along the line. When a change is made which
immediately touches only a minor point in the scheme, the consequent
derangement of the structure of conventionalities may be inconspicuous;
but even in such a case it is safe to say that some derangement of the
general scheme, more or less far-reaching, will follow. On the
other hand, when an attempted reform involves the suppression or
thorough-going remodelling of an institution of first-rate importance
in the conventional scheme, it is immediately felt that a serious
derangement of the entire scheme would result; it is felt that a
readjustment of the structure to the new form taken on by one of
its chief elements would be a painful and tedious, if not a doubtful
process.

In order to realize the difficulty which such a radical change in any
one feature of the conventional scheme of life would involve, it is only
necessary to suggest the suppression of the monogamic family, or of
the agnatic syst