330 THE SOCIAL COMPONENTS

preference for photographs of recognizable contemporary scenes to in-
distinct paintings of ancient things; and while the line in front of a
motion-picture house may be a block long, there is never much of a
crush in an art museum. The continued indifference of the mnsses to the
fine arts has, however, saved the fine arts for the social elite and has thus
assured their continued definition as "fine."

Art and Science.—The attempt to lift up the masses by an artistic boot-
strap has in general given way to more prosaic, and more feasible, edu-
cational programs, such as vocational training. But the belief that the
fine arts are somehow of prime social significance has nevertheless per-
sisted. This belief is so strong that it actually hampered the Allied mili-
tary forces during the Italian campaign of 1943, for the military felt im-
pelled, out of consideration for American and British public opinion, to
avoid insofar as possible destroying the artistic relics with which Italy is
littered. And it is this belief that at the moment seems to jeopardize
the future of the sciences.

Art and science are functionally no more incompatible than arc re-
ligion and science. The one deals with nonutilitarian values and the other
with utilitarian matters; the one caters to man's need for recreation, and
the other to his need for food, freedom from disease, etc. When spokes-
men for the arts claim for the arts utilitarian significance, they are then
encroaching on the sciences. And when, as is the present trend in Ameri-
can universities, their claim becomes the basis for action, the sciences are,
as was indicated earlier, endangered.1 The fine arts, including that verbal

1 This matter has nowhere been more clearly stated than by E. Fnris in his review
of a recent translation, of a book by an early nineteenth-century European mystic.
Paris says:

"For the sociologist the point of great interest is not the accuracy of any inter-
pretation but rather the extraordinary fact—and it is extraordinary—of the great
vogue which this author [S. Kierkegaard, spiritual grandfather of the current cult
known as "existentialism"] enjoys in these war years. . . . There is a current re-
action against the scientific method and all it implies. Ncoscholasticism, now so
vigorous, is but one symptom. Epithets are hurled and men berate 'scientist)),' which
they blame for our present woes. Science and *thc machine* arc said to cause our ^
wars. Faith is lacking, and so the world is bathed in blood. And yet there was once
a war which ran for thirty years at a time when there were no machines in the
modern sense, and the seventeenth century witnessed Christians killing other Chris-
tians for the sake of a creed. Half the population of Saxony wcie exterminated in
an age when all Europe professed the Christian faith.

"But still many are bewildered and many grope in darkness and in dread. They
have lost faith in the ability of men to solve our problems and yearn for some
absolute authority. Because scientists have not yet solved all our problems, they
belittle what we have done and deprecate the efforts of those who arc striving to
discover the secrets of nature, all nature, including human nature, sa that our lives
may have intelligent direction.

"They have lost their nerve. They cry out that we should have ideals, not realiz-
ing that such an appeal is sheer magic if it neglects to discover the conditions
under which this is possible. . . ." (Amer. J. Social., vol. 50, pp. 403-404, 1945.)