dividual. But even these are rare. Should any one
transgress the law, he is punished, not imprisoned. Only a fool would go
to the trouble and expense of keeping a man imprisoned. A delinquent is
punished so severely that he will not transgress the law a second time;
for a second serious offense against society is punished usually with
death. From what I have told you, you can gather that we are not the
savages the world imagines men to be who lead a natural existence. You
can see how easily we, with our knowledge and theirs, could lead them to
the light."

"Is there nothing between the picture your people present and the world
we know?"

"Nothing! What else could there be? After the final appraisement of
things has been taken and they have been weighed in the balance and
adjudged, this is the condition that must confront mankind, for no other
condition offers man such unlimited scope for the development of his
higher nature. What you see is the true picture of the delivered man.
The Golden Age, or the Garden of Eden is no myth. Men once were free and
remained so until they gave way to desire and established for themselves
a world of delusion in which there is no permanency either of thought or
possession. The traditions of all nations and all peoples, from time
immemorial, tell of this state when men were free. They also predict
the destruction of present-day society. The Utopias and Golden Ages
depicted by poets and dreamers, though beautiful to dwell upon in fancy,
are of the tissue of dreams. They will not bear analysis. They are
merely other names for different forms of bondage; the same old romantic
fallacies which we are forever meeting in works of fiction."

"And how long shall the world we know continue until the new
dispensation comes to pass?"

"Until men overcome the fear of death! Then shall they be born anew and
come into their rightful heritage. Then shall they grasp the spiritual
significance of the Golden Age as voiced by the Prophet: When first the
foundations of the Earth were laid; when the morning stars sang together
and all the Sons of God shouted for joy, for we are they!"

XLI

On either side of the village, forming a vast semicircle, stood
innumerable lodges and hogans, temporary structures erected by the
inhabitants of the other villages, who had come to show homage to the
Princess and the White Chief, as the Captain was called.

While gazing in the direction of the village which