of industries was recognized, leading up to a
well-known prosperity. That perception was their philosophy. The
environment was understood through and through. And this common
knowledge, existing apart from any individual in particular, served
every individual instead of a set of private opinions of his own. To get
away from it was impossible, for it was real knowledge; a man's
practical thoughts had to harmonize with it; supported by it, he was
saved the trouble of thinking things out in "systems"; and in fact it
was a better guide to him than thought-out systems could have been,
because generations of experience had fitted it so perfectly to the
narrow environment of the valley. So long, therefore, as the environment
remained unaltered, the truth that the people's minds held few ideas
upon other subjects, and had developed no method of systematic thinking,
was veiled.

But it has become plain enough now that the old environment is gone. The
new thrift has laid bare the nakedness of the land. It has found the
villagers unequipped with any efficient mental habits appropriate to
the altered conditions, and shown them to be at a loss for interesting
ideas in other directions. They cannot see their way any longer. They
have no aims; at any rate, no man is sure what his own aims ought to be,
or has any confidence that his neighbours could enlighten him. Life has
grown meaningless, stupid; an apathy reigns in the village--a dull
waiting, with nothing in particular for which to wait.

XV

THE OPPORTUNITY

Amongst so many drawbacks to the new thrift, one good thing that it has
brought to the villagers, in the shape of a little leisure, gives us the
means of seeing in more detail how destitute of interests their life has
become. It must be owned that the leisure is very scanty. It is so
obscured, too, by the people's habit of putting themselves to productive
work in it that I have sometimes doubted if any benefit of the kind
actually filtered down into their overburdened lives. Others, however,
with a more business-like interest in the matter than mine, have
recognized that a new thing has come into the country labourer's life,
although they do not speak of it as "leisure." Mere wasted time is what
it looks like to them. Thus, not long ago, an acquaintance who by no
means shares my views of these matters was deploring to me the
degenerate state, as he conceived it, of the labourers on certain farms
in which he is i