One needn’t be much of a psychologist to realize that if
this rumor is not stamped out now, in a few years it is capable of diseasing
the whole Empire, and one doesn’t have to be a prophet to predict the
consequences if it should.
Reason will be replaced by Revelation. Instead of Rational
Law, objective truths perceptible to any who will undergo the necessary
intellectual discipline, and the same for all, Knowledge will degenerate into a
riot of subjective visions—feelings in the solar plexus induced by undernourishment,
angelic images generated by fevers or drugs, dream warnings inspired by the
sound of falling water. Whole cosmologies will be created out of some forgotten
personal resentment, complete epics written in private languages, the daubs of
school children ranked above the great masterpieces.
Idealism will be replaced by Materialism. Priapus will only
have to move to a good address and call himself Eros to become darling of
middle-aged women. Live after death will be an eternal dinner party where al
the guests are twenty years old. Diverted form its normal and wholesome outlet
in patriotism and civic or family pride, the need of the materialistic Masses
for some visible Idol to worship will be driven into totally unsocial channels
where no education can reach it. Divine honors will be paid to silver tea-pots,
shallow depressions in the earth, names on maps, domestic pets, ruined
windmills, even in extreme cases, which will become increasingly common, to
headaches, or malignant tumors, or four o’clock in the afternoon.
Justice will be replaced by Pity as the cardinal human
virtue, and all fear of retribution will vanish. Every corner-boy will
congratulate himself: “I’m such a sinner that God had to come down in person to
save me. I must be a devil of a fellow.” Every crook will argue, “I like
committing crimes. God likes forgiving them. Really the world is admirably
arranged.” And the ambition of every young cop will be to secure a death-bed repentance.
The New Aristocracy will consist exclusively of hermits, bums, and permanent
invalids. The Rough Diamond, the Consumptive Whore, the bandit who is good to
his mother, the epileptic girl who has a way with the animals will be the heroes
and heroines of the New Tragedy when the general, the statesman, and the
philosopher have become the butt of every farce and satire.
Naturally this cannot be allowed to happen. Civilization
must be saved even if this means sending for the military, as I suppose it
does. How dreary. Why is it that in the end civilization always has to call in
those professional tidiers to whom it is all one it be Pythagoras or a
homicidal lunatic that they are instructed to exterminate. O dear, Why couldn’t
this wretched infant be born somewhere else? Why can’t people be sensible? I
don’t want to be horrid. Why can’t they see that the notion of a finite God is
absurd? Because it is. And suppose, for the sake of argument, that it isn’t
that this story is true, that this child is in some inexplicable manner both
God and Man, that he grows up, lives and dies, without committing a single sin?
Would that make life any better? On the contrary it would make it far, far
worse. For it could only mean this: that once having shown them how, God would
expect every man, whatever his fortune, to lead a sinless life in the flesh and
on earth. Then indeed would the human race be plunged into madness and despair.
And for me personally at this moment it would mean that God had given me the
power to destroy Himself. I refuse to be taken in. He could not play such a
horrid practical joke. Why should he dislike me so? I’ve worked like a slave.
As anyone you like. I read all official dispatches without skipping. I’ve taken
elocution lessons. I’ve hardly ever taken bribes. How dare he allow me to
decide/ I’ve tried to be good. I brush my teeth every single night. I haven’t
had sex for a month. I object. I’m a liberal. I want everyone to be happy. I
wish I had never been born.
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