“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

You may laugh with some disdain when I mention, for example, that in some other societies, both today and in the past (pause) a gentleman proved his moral worth and value by not working. Now that idea is no more ludicrous than the idea you have, for both attempt to prove personal merit through the manipulation of money and status.

It is as ridiculous to prove your worth by working in a conventional sense as it is to prove your worth by not working in a conventional sense. Americans have had a fine and often understandable disdain for what was thought of as the European gentleman, or even the literary gentleman, or the man who somehow or other did not have to “rub elbows with the masses.”

(Pause.) Most men’s abilities are prosaic enough and conventional enough so that their value can be ascertained—or worked out by labor unions (amused). If all a man can do to “prove his value” is to put a bolt in a car, or drive a truck, or even teach a class, then he is very careful that that contribution be noticed, and that a definite value be given it. You cannot estimate the value of ideas or of creativity in that fashion.