sures for the moth; and the Rust-kings, who are to their peoples'
strength as rust to armor, lay up treasures for the rust; and the
Robber-kings, treasures for the robber; but how few kings have ever
laid up treasures that needed no guarding--treasures of which, the more
thieves there were, the better! Broidered robe, only to be rent; helm
and sword, only to be dimmed; jewel and gold, only to be
scattered;--there have been three kinds of kings who have gathered
these. Suppose there ever should arise a Fourth order of kings, who
had read, in some obscure writing of long ago, that there was a Fourth
kind of treasure, which the jewel and gold could not equal, neither
should it be valued with pure gold. A web made fair in the weaving, by
Athena's shuttle; an armor, forged in divine fire by Vulcanian force--a
gold to be mined in the sun's red heart, where he sets over the
Delphian cliffs;--deep-pictured tissue, impenetrable armor, potable
gold!--the three great Angels of Conduct, Toil, and Thought, still
calling to us, and waiting at the posts of our doors, to lead us, with
their winged power, and guide us, with their unerring eyes, by the path
which no fowl knoweth, and which the vulture's eye has not seen!
Suppose kings should ever arise, who heard and believed this word, and
at last gathered and brought forth treasures of--Wisdom--for their
people?

46. Think what an amazing business _that_ would be! How
inconceivable, in the state of our present national wisdom! That we
should bring up our peasants to a book exercise instead of a bayonet
exercise!--organize, drill, maintain with pay, and good generalship,
armies of thinkers, instead of armies of stabbers!--find national
amusement in reading-rooms as well as rifle-grounds; give prizes for a
fair shot at a fact, as well as for a leaden splash on a target. What
an absurd idea it seems, put fairly in words, that the wealth of the
capitalists of civilized nations should ever come to support literature
instead of war!

47. Have yet patience with me, while I read you a single sentence out
of the only book, properly to be called a book, that I have yet written
myself, the one that will stand (if anything stand) surest and longest
of all work of mine.

"It is one very awful form of the operation of wealth in Europe that it
is entirely capitalists' wealth that supports unjust wars. Just wars
do not need so much money to support them; for most of the men who wage
such,