O humanitas!

Who will save the humanities? Who will protect them? O humanitas, thou art not safe in these perilous times. The black clouds of economic recession loom over you, the chill winds of cynicism lash you, the once-firm ground of patronage quakes beneath your feet. Who will fight against the university presidents, slashing you with their gilt machetes in the interest of cutting costs? Who will lift you up after legions of computer science and business majors ride roughshod over you? Who will lead the charge into the land of the philistines?

O humanitas, in their eyes you are currency without value, the preserve of academics and armchair philosophers, neither of them able to generate any real lucre. For that you are politely acknowledged, but privately reviled, shunted off, and forgotten -- that is, when you aren't being dragged along to cocktail parties to make cultural capital of your venerable traditions.

Gerard Manley Hopkins quietly lamented,

And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;
And wears man’s smudge and shares man’s smell: the soil
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.