Some people think of a civilization as a stock of things like books, pictures, musical instruments and compositions, buildings, cities, landscapes, inventions, devices, machines and so on—in short, as the results of mankind having impressed itself upon a 'natural' world. But this is an unduly restricted (indeed, an exceedingly primitive) understanding of that 'second nature' (as Hegel called it) which is the context of our activity. The world into which we are initiated is composed, rather, of a stock of emotions, beliefs, images, ideas, manners of thinking, languages, skills, practices and manners of activity out of which these 'things' are generated. And consequently it is appropriate to think of it not as a stock but as a capital; that is, somthing [sic] known and enjoyed only in use. For none of these is fixed and finished; each is at once an achievement and a promise. This capital has been accumulated over hundreds of years. And in use it earns an interest, part of which is consumed in a current manner of living and part reinvested.
(Michael Oakeshott, "The Study of 'Politics' in a University: An Essay in Appropriateness," in his Rationalism in Politics and Other Essays, new and expanded ed. [Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 1991], 184-218, at 187 [essay first published in 1962])
Keith Burgess-Jackson, J.D., Ph.D. 