[Sidenote:  The Thirst for Power]

To this thirst for power may be traced all of woman’s vanity.  It is commonly supposed that she dresses to please others, but she often values fine raiment principally because it shows how much her husband thinks of her.  If a man’s coat is shiny at the seams and he postpones the new one that his wife may have an extra hat, she is delicately flattered by this unselfish tribute to her charm.

From a single root vanity spreads and flowers until its poisonous blooms affect all social life.  A woman becomes vain of her house, her rugs, her tapestries, her jewels, horses, and even of the livery of her footman.  The things which should be valued for their intrinsic beauty and the pleasure-giving quality, which is not by any means selfish, soon become food for a vice.

She gradually grows to consider herself a very superior person.  She is so charming and so much to be desired, that some man works night and day in his office, sacrificing both pleasure and rest, that she may have the baubles for which she yearns.

It is not far from absolute self-satisfaction, in either man or woman, to generous bestowal of enlightenment upon the unfortunate savages who linger on the outskirts of one’s social sphere.

In the infinite vastness of creation, where innumerable worlds move according to the fiat of majestic Law, there lies one called Earth.  There are planets within reach of the scientific vision of its inhabitants that are many times larger.  There are some which have more moons, more mountains and rivers, longer days, and longer years.  Countless suns, the centres of other vast planetary systems, lie in the inconceivable distances beyond.

[Sidenote:  A Mote in the Sun]

In the midst of this unspeakable greatness, Earth swings like one of the motes which a passing sunbeam illumines.  Upon this mote, one fifth of the inhabitants have assumed supreme knowledge and understanding, given them, doubtless, because of their innate superiority.  This preferment, also, is theirs by the grace of an infinitely just and merciful God.

The other four fifths are supposedly in total darkness, though the same heavens are over their heads, the same earth under their feet, and though the light of sun and moon and the gentle radiance of the stars are freely given to all.

There are the same opportunities for development and civilisation, but they have not received The Enlightenment.  To them must go the foreign missionaries, to teach the things which have been graciously given them on account of their innate superiority.

[Sidenote:  Narrowing Circles]

Man’s life is a succession of narrowing circles.  He admits the force of the heliocentric idea, for it is the sun which gives light and heat.  Then the circle narrows, almost imperceptibly, for, of all the planets which circle around the sun, is not Earth the chief?