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...before it is too late, in -- each individual case, please consider those -- this sheet from Mr. Smith's book, Yankee and God, a present. And you have to take it to the exam, and you have to write about it; so you'd better study it. And you'd better not throw it away; I have no other copies. So anybody who loses it will have to sit down and copy it from somebody else in this class. I warned you beforehand about this. I would like to suggest -- thought it was -- wiser to repeat it. Otherwise there will be weeping, and gnashing of teeth.

Let's go back to Jason Lee in his attempt to interest the Congress of the United States in the organization of a new territory out in Oregon, the jurisdiction of which was, at that time, still mightily in doubt whether it was to be British or American. Jason Lee thought that his mission--with the readiness of becoming a martyr--had to be changed, transformed into a political task of leadership in a secular society, that this wonderful territory out there could not be held by a missionary and his red Indians, but that it had to be transformed, so that in his own person, he lived through the transformation from a missionary to the Gentiles into an occupant, a pioneer of new government.

And so in his own person, the same reformation or transformation take -- took place as in the case of Brigham Young when he became -- from a leader of a church, the leader of a people into the wilderness and had to make -- pass laws on irrigation--as they did in Utah--by which this desert could be lived in. And many of the sermons, by the way, of Brigham Young, you may -- interested to hear, are about the problem of the discipline of irrigation, and how he -- he tried very honestly to behave just as one member of the group. That is, he didn't claim more water than the neighbors, but then in his sermons, he would accuse them that they didn't use the -- the -- the water as he did, that they didn't plant the fruit trees which could have grown on his irrigated land, and that was a tremendous loss to community. I don't know if he -- drove these -- these enemies of his to suicide, or what happened, but certainly he didn't mince any words in his sermons to show to them that his secular leadership, you see, although based on democratic principles, demanded that everybody should chip in.

The same is true of Jason Lee. Only in the case of his marriage, he is still the missionary, because this -- I told you, the lady arrived in June, and middle of July there is the wedding; and they had never seen -- set eyes on each other before. And I tried to convince you of the fact that in the missionary and pioneering state, it is the women who bear the brunt, the excessive brunt of the act -- or the heroic act of faith that goes with -- in -- going in to a new country among the heathen. The man proves his value on the battlefield; but if there is no battle, but

if there is only pioneering--"only" I shouldn't say, I mean--if there -- instead pioneering, the warfare in the United States has been with the land, and its dangers. And hence the rules of warfare have not been identical with the rules of warfare of soldiers.

In soldiering, obviously, the man takes this risk of his life. In this overland warfare against red Indians, and illness, and storms -- sandstorms, and what-not, the women and children are directly exposed. And I often think, if you want to understand your own tradition in this country, you -- the amount of pacifism that occurs here in the mental -- feeble-minded -- mental feeble-minded, the amount of not understanding how this country has been founded, it comes from this strange segregation, or separation, or division between war and conquest. This country has been conquered, but nobody speaks much of the warfare against the Indians in the terms of war. And so you try to think of this country as a peaceful people, settled by -- in peaceful manner. That isn't at all true. There is -- more shooting and more violence has gone on than in any other country of Europe certainly in the last 150 years.

And I think it must be this -- this -- your looking away from the identity of the territorial occupation of this country --. If you get -- we are given title by the English to conquer the rest of the -- of the continent -- or by the Spaniards and the French, that doesn't mean that you don't have to -- still have to conquer. And it is, I think, this -- the separation of the legal title given by some colonial power at home, in -- in Europe, to the -- to the colonials, here--this confusion between this legal title of the Louisiana Purchase, for example--and the facts of the matter that the country -- the regions just the same still have to be occupied, you see, by violence, and by real enterprise, that blinds people in this country to the fact that it isn't -- that you get the Louisiana Purchase, the thir- -- territory of 13 states by a legal contract between cunning Talleyrand and -- and cunning Jefferson. They were both cunning, I think. And that's on paper.

But the country is not like the exchange of another territory in Europe, where people have lived for thousands of years in a civilized manner, if you now -- deal about -- have a -- dealings wi- -- about the contract about Berlin, that's a very different thing than if you deal with 13 unoccupied territories of later statehood, and -- in the Louisiana Purchase. And that's real war, just without the declaration, without -- without the legal forms of it.

And I think the mentality of this country is -- is readily hurt -- really hurt, because the good boys of today--and the girls perhaps even more--in our cities, grow up with this quite wrong idea that this country has behind it some unfortunate incidents like the Civil War, which was the bloodiest war of the 19th century, as you may know, and that for the rest this is a peace-loving country.

This is a country of constant violence. You just have to go to the movies to see that. There doesn't exist in any other country that amount of cold-blooded cruelty. And they are now shooting a film that will make America notorious for cruelty, "Spartacus." You should hiss it. It's a scandal. And it does more harm to our reputation than anything else you can produce. Or go to "The Cold {Maya}," or any of this stuff. Just scandalous, the cruelty shown there. And just for cruelty's sake, because violence is the only thing that seems to interest to -- a rather general public. It's the lowest common denominator. And now you tell me that this is a -- a mild-mannered and peace-loving country. You betray yourself. What do you look at every evening? Violence, shooting, every evening.

I'm -- I mean, I go, as I -- once a year to the movies, but -- but then I am sick for the rest of the year. And you -- devil are tempting me to go again. Not right. I complain bitterly.

Well, the ma- -- important thing you must -- you must understand is that if you do not label the conquest of the West "warfare," and you don't even -- call it "conquest," it easily falls under the activities of civilians. But obviously nobody could go out into the wilderness or into -- for the Gold Rush to California, who felt as a civilian. He always had to have his pistol here, in his belt. And anybody who goes around armed in sel- -- is certainly not a civilian.

And it is -- I had so many experiences in this matter that I hope you will understand why I try to draw your attention to your own and inner, I think, lack of -- of courage to con- -- be confronted with the real story.

I had a -- a minister, the minister of my own church in the little town in which we live, came out very strongly against the Second World War in his sermons. And I s- -- went to him and said, "Now, look here. You are young. You are not drafted. You have yourself two sons, and a wife. The future of the United States is decided on these battlefields of the -- World War II; and you talk all my students here out of their duty to serve. This you cannot do. You -- your office and your private opinions are not the same. We didn't appoint you minister of this church to spread your idiotic ideas. The Gospel is not -- has nothing to do with Mr. Smith's private ideas."

He said, "Well, what do you want? This is -- this is Christianity."

"Well," I said, "look here." We talked till 2 o'clock in the morning in my house.

And he said, finally, "Well, but -- I will never use violence."

I said, "I wonder -- a very simple case. A -- a man comes to your house and wants to kidnap your two young sons. What are you going to do?"

And he said, "I go to the telephone and ask the police to come."

Then I gave up. I mean, this is -- this -- such a man is allowed to preach from a Christian pulpit, such an idiot, such a liar, such a hypocrite, such a pharisee. It's terrible. Here are his two sons under his care, and he doesn't do his duty and he calls the police. Well, if there is still time for the police, what's the police then doing? Act in his father's -- the father's stead, that's all. Use violence.

So it is -- but this vicious circle I -- I run into time and again in -- among you people. And I -- it is really -- shows -- an absolute impotency to understand the problem of statehood, of government. If you do not know that a soldier in the trenches is the United States, which is in -- in the position of either being blown down and -- to pass out of her existence, or stand up and assert its existence at this very moment, if the soldier to you is just a -- pawn, but not the states in action, then God help you. If you have a burglar come into your house, you are the -- this castle's, you see, -- {castlain}. You are the -- the lord of this place. And if this is -- if you have lost this feeling that the house is under your care and under your responsibility, you have dismissed all your rights as a -- as a fath- -- member of the church, because at your house, you are Church and state in -- in one. And if you have a guest, you have to protect him, by violence, if somebody attacks your guest.

I just read this morning the story of Lot, in -- in Sodom, where he offers his own daughters preferably to the violation of his guests. And he said, "Take my daughters and debauch them, but not my -- guests." Which only goes to show you that he had the full sovereignty of his house, you see, and he knew that he -- there was nobody else to whom he could telephone. No police.

It is a -- I think that's the deepest mental schizophrenia in this country. And it has to do with the fact that there are so infinitely more schizoids in this country than in any other nation of the world. You have made up for yourself a pipe dream of an existence of civilian, peaceful life. Somebody else does the violence -- vicariously. You enjoy it. You buy the ticket. You support this industry which produces this violence in -- in your -- in your imagination every day. But it has nothing to do with your philosophy. If you analyze who you are, then you think of yourself that you are a very nice, kind chap, while you are a bloodthirsty vampire.

We are not nice to look into. And the sooner you understand this, then the sooner you will do battle how to stem the flood in this -- in this magma of wick-

edness which is in all of us.

It is just incredible, the picture people try to have until they go to the psychoanalyst. And he then tells them the opposite, and goes too far to the other extreme. We are not nice. And we are all at war, every one of us. But we have vicarious people to -- to do the warfare. You -- you appoint them, and then forget about their tragedy. Have you ever thought of the tragedy of an executioner? But if he didn't have the courage to execute, you would have had to have it.

There is no action in the community for which in a new state of affairs you will not be held responsible. And I -- I advise you all to read--we come to this--Owen Wister's Virginian, the famous novel which is the paradigma of all your westerners. Of all the western movies you -- you said you see, this is the -- the creative agency, because this book made epoch. It was published in 1902, and there never had -- before been westerners. And you all go to the westerners without even knowing that they all come from this book in which a righteous man takes the law into his own hands because there is not yet the division of civilian and, you see, belligerent government; and -- and sets things right in the state of Wyoming. Well, you know of the vigilantes in this country -- state of course; it's the same story. It has been stu- -- true in every territory that had to be conquered, that there has been before the separation of civilian and military government a complete fusion. The first generation had to do both. You had -- they had to go around armed.

And so now you can't say, "That's the sheriff's business," and "That's the police business," and "That's the airplane's business," and "That's the jet plane's business," and "That's the atomic bomb commission." We are this. And we want to remain rich. And we would complain bitterly if they wouldn't build the bombs. But I hear these -- hear these peace-loving people all talk about it as though we could afford, so to speak, to write off the bomb. Do you think for one minute the -- our neighbors in -- in -- in Asia and -- and Si- -- Siberia would hesitate to take over our bank accounts? That's what they're after. And we would be very much surprised if they could do it, and would say, "Oh, we wanted of course to disarm, but we didn't mean to dis- -- to be disowned and expropriated."

War is a business of proper- -- protection of property, of -- of -- of your standard of living. Now you want to have the standard of living and the property without the investment of your own belligerency. That cannot be done. If you will become a monk, and take an oath of chastity, of poverty, and of obedience, you don't have to go to war. That's the only condition, in -- on -- in our tradition which allows a man to -- to forfeit his duty to -- to use arms.

Obviously, because a man who is chaste has no family to -- you see,

whose lives he has to save and protect. And he -- since he is poor, he has no money interest, no business which he has to run, whose workers he is responsible for, and for whose production he stands. And if he is obedient, he has no will of his own, and so allows others to -- to use his will. But that's a very -- a c- -- a condition the modern pacifist doesn't want to fulfill. He wants to have his ea- -- cake and eat it, too.

As soon as you separate peace and war, your thinking isn't worth anything. Any statement you make about the peace society you like is only valid if you know that it only exists as long as you invest your whole existence into -- into upholding it. The -- the rest is wishful thinking, you -- worth absolutely nothing. For schoolboys. But what has happened in this country is that schoolboys I think are much more -- much more combative. And what is permissible in a 10-year-old boy, these pipe dreams, they are absolutely unpermissible in 20year-old people.

To come back to Jason Lee in whom this climaxes. And Jason Lee goes there willingly, because he wants to do good, and he wants to suffer -- or he's will- -- ready to suffer. When he gets this idea of secular government, he needs power. The spirit doesn't need power. But the civilian gov- -- order does need power. So he takes this -- sends his petition first to Washington. And then he goes two years later himself, on an overland trip -- of course, as you know, very painful. Six months again he is on his way. And while he is halfway through, near Independence, Missouri, a messenger reaches him and says that his wife and s- -- child out there in Oregon have died.

So after exactly 12 months of married life, he is a widower. And that of course belongs to the missionary -- expense account. That's the budget of missions. The family is destroyed. And he goes to Washington and pleads with the people for organizing a territory. And in so far he succeeds, as with the year 1841, there begins this steady influx into Oregon of annually, by and large, 1,000 or 2,000 settlers, which was enough to save the territory for the Union. He himself was chairman of two meetings in Champoeg, in which there was voted the organization of a government--a governor, a lieutenant governor, and a legislature--in this new territory. Also in -- already in 1841, he has -- is as far advanced that he can -- lay the groundwork of what is today the University of Oregon in -- in -- in Salem, which is a remarkable feat.

As early as that, you see, goes with the -- organization of the territory also the laying of the groundwork of the school of higher learning, which is for the production of officeholders. An institution of higher learning is nothing but the means of a -- the faith of a community that the next generation needs independent minds to take office. And that's what Harvard was founded for in 1636. And

today the use of the liberal arts college in this respect seems to be also forgotten. You think it's a -- having a good time. It has nothing to do with that. The -- I think the sacrifices made by this state, especially, in this immense variety of colleges and schools is only justified in a democracy as long as we think that the future governors of this state, and all the professions, must come from these schools.

If they disenable you, these schools, to become governor of California, then they have to close these institutions of higher learning. And it sometimes looks to me as though they do that -- just that. They make you weak. They make you soft. They disintegrate your mind. And it has -- very often been said, especially by Woodrow Wilson, that a man like Abraham Lincoln could never reach -- attained his greatness if he had gone to college.

I'm happy to report that the -- we had a secretary of state whose -- left college after the first year with 55 in his marks. Well, he wasn't a good secretary of state, either. But it is a remarkable story that this is still possible in this country, isn't it? Fifty-five is not a high standing.

To come back to the probl- -- history of Mr. Jason Lee's personal experience. There are two items. He is defeated in his missionary work in the sense that his political plans prosper and the Church goes back on him. Of course, the Methodists felt that he had transformed his status, you see, into a lay leader. And so they called him back. And he is buried in this little village in Ontario, Canada, on the Vermont border, because he died out of office, unsung. He married again on his trip to Washington, a second time, and his wife died, leaving one daughter behind. So he had the tragedy of this missionary existence even a second time. For the -- as you know, at that time tuberculosis was so rampant that most of these young women died from -- from this.

So he lost two wives in the process, and two chil- -- no, one child, was himself deposed, not directly dishonorable. But he arrived in New York -- in Washington, they had a meeting and cleared him from all reproach of abuses, but did not reinstate him. So he died a broken-hearted man. That's one thing, that as a missionary, he ha-- so to speak, he had to divest himself of his claim, and here you have the very painful process when a man ceases to be a Jew and becomes a Christian, as our Lord; or when he ceases to be a missionary and becomes a governor -- or tries to become a governor. It -- he has to pay the penalty of this misunderstanding. The people who have supported him so far go back on him and say, "That's not what we meant." You cannot make your regent board grow with you, so to speak, you see. If you see the light, it is impossible for the people who have labeled this under a different column of their thinking, to take them -- to take them with you, I mean. Never believe that if you are -- make

a great change in your life, that it is natural that anybody in your family should understand that. You cannot expect that. That takes another 10 years, or 15, before they can follow and understand what you're doing.

Thi- -- of this Jason Lee I think is a very painful example. Here is a man who says, "secular government" and is let down by the people who had said, "mission."

The second thing I would like you to consider is this great question for which the -- the turbulence of what we call a "church" or a "people" is always a -- a reminder--the question: how much failure is necessary for success? It is today, it seems to me, the question of all questions -- this is the question of history. -- In 1836, the first -- the first request was sent to Washington by proxy, by this paymaster {Slacum}. The second was presented by him himself, in Washington, by Lee. The third was when he presided over a meeting in Champoeg in the state -- future state of Oregon. And then with one vote, by the way--one vote, as all good decisions are--it was passed, one vote majority, a -- the decision was taken to establish a provisional government, you see, have the governor appointed. That again is I think -- interesting sidelight to history. Important decisions are never made unanimously. All -- defy yourself of all unanimous decisions. They aren't serious. They are cheap. Unanimity just shows that nobody sees the danger of the step. People are blind. That hasn't been profiled, that has not been created. All created things are as painful as travail, as a childbirth. And the child has to depart from the mother's womb in great pain.

So any decision which you -- populace makes unanimous -- well, usually it's an indifferent decision. And it can pass like that, you see, but it is not an important decision. Really important decisions are fought upon, and they are passed, with a -- as close a majority, so to speak, as possible.

And -- this was done in the face of -- the territory of Oregon. With one vote, it was carried. And the interesting fact was, this was a Canadian who gave this vote in favor of the American settlement, because in watching the newcomers, he felt that they constituted a better set of man than the French Canadians and the English fur traders who had come from the North. So even this has a -- a kind of character of conversion, because this man had just judged the thing, you see, from what he saw. And he saw that these families, who had come up the hard way on the Oregon Trail, meant business to a much larger extent, because they wanted to settle on the good land and become farmers, you see, compared to the fur traders who only thought of rapid, commercial gain, you see, in two or three seasons. And then they wanted, of course, to retire if they could.

So I think this -- this meeting in Champoeg reveals you all the -- the

romance of dis- -- the discovery of the conditions under which new land can be, and should be, settled. By whom? And the -- resolve was, by and large, that these wagon trail armies--and I tried to tell you that these were communities founded on the road in these six months and seven months of dangerous traveling, with half of the people buried on the way--that these people were then entitled to run the place. And so it was decided, and that's why Oregon today doesn't belong to -- doesn't belong to British Columbia, but is a part of the United States.

But how much -- there was then a second meeting in Champoeg in which this had to be dec- -- repeated. And if you count -- the life of Jason Lee, it's very much like Herman Melville. On the surface of things, they are both defeated, you see; they are both failures. And both are great successes. And if you begin to understand this, you will know how one has to live, with complete indifference to failure and success. The fact that you can succeed is not a reason to do anything. And the fact that you must fail is not a reason to omit anything. That's not yours to decide, whether you should fail or succeed.

But since everybody here is out for the alleged success story, I had to warn you: that's not the way history has ever been made. History has only been made by people who do what has to be done, regardless of the outcome. That's the only decision you can make in history. And all the people who have the -- success guaranteed in their pocket are the most miserable of creatures, because they only get what they want. And that's always too little. You are always more than this little brain of yours. Your mind is when we have great appetite, you see. But what is fitting for you, your mind is the last to know.

Mr. {Knowland} is a good example. Study Mr. {Knowland}, and you know why it is not enough to be successful, or a failure, in both cases. His story is very interesting, because he was spoiled from -- from his youth. Isn't that true? And he never faced this fact that you had to do what was right, regardless of success, because he thought success was in the family, part of the family.

I think here in California really his case deserves great study. It's a warning of what should not happen. And Lee is a -- case I think of admiration, because -- that such a pioneer who shifts from the religious goal of missions outside to this occupation of a new virgin territory inside, that he should pay a penalty--you must understand--that is inevitable. But only by such a miscarriage can the day of the future be accelerated. The victim, the martyr, fills the breach, the time gap between the cultural lag of the -- of the churchgoing, decent respectable people in the community, and that what is necessary. We are always behind the times in affairs that do not concern us ourselves, you see. And the only person who can accelerate--as in the case of Bill Mitchell, for example, you see, or in the case of Jason Lee--is somebody who is willing to pay the penalty of

being misjudged, of being -- of being attacked. And he will be as -- the more effective the fewer illusions he has about this necessity.

The time gap in history is always filled by that person who forgoes his individual success, because this way he secures the success of the action, of the cause, and he makes it possible by taking the spears of the enemies into his own br- -- chest that the thing itself survives.

I told you this was true of Joseph Smith even, that he provoked the persecution, you see, was accordingly killed in 1844. And the state of the Mormons became a reality, you see, ever since, afterward.

This is today -- dismissed; and -- and profligate people who call themselves "psychologists" and "psychoanalysts," and "sociologists" try to tell you that you can live successfully. You can have success, but then you don't live. That's not life. That's something much cheaper. That's -- suspended animation, and you -- you are in hell, because anybody who only lives for his own purposes, you see, lives in prison. Because your mind is a prison. You are incarcerated into the categories of your little men- --. Think of it. Here you are, a creature of God -- of the last millions of years the product, and you undertake with your little mind to say what you're good for.

And that's why I think it is very wise in this country that people are honored when they are elected to office, because somebody else is uttering -- expressing an opinion on this man, you see, and not they themselves. That's why, I mean, it is doubtful whether a secretary of state should be in the succession to the presidency in an emergency, you see, because he doesn't hold elective office, you see. He's -- and so he is not made by -- by the community, but by his own volition, so to speak. That's not a good claim.

Life is a constant correction of our mind by events and of the events by our mind. It's an interaction. Our mind is very useful, but it is only one of the partners of the conversation which is going on in your existence. And as soon as you make the mind more than an eccentric -- that is, some bystander in -- in your life, you go where you are -- right to -- begin to become a case. All the people who put their mind in the middle of their existence put him in the wrong place. Eccentric. He's not in the middle, you see, but he looks at you, of course. I look at myself, and I don't like what I see. And I dismiss it, and I hope that somebody else will like me sufficiently to make up for my dislike of myself. And that's why -- I think, as all -- how all of us should live. But as soon as you, however, change this around, and say, "My mind is the judge. Here is the center. I'm a wonderful fellow," watch out, I mean. You begin to be a case, you see. The only thing a man can say to himself is that he is an abomination.

Fortunately we live in mutual -- in mutual kindness and in mutual forbearing. And the other people support us in our conviction that mine -- own mental judgment may be a little exaggerated.

Now in -- for this, I think Jason Lee is therefore a pivotal picture -- figure. And it is obvious that in our literature, he is bandied around. The people in Oregon of course have written volumes on this man; and nobody knows quite what to say, because most historians today -- boast of being purely secular and have of course no use for the clerical beginnings of the man. I think, to you and me, he should be an important person, because he -- when he started, he thought he had the people of America, as -- the church people, behind himself in order to throw himself in for the missions. Then he came to the conclusion that there was a place where he should bring in people, and so brought these military -- these -- adventurers over the Oregon Trail.

And so the character of missions at that point, so to speak, is blunted. As I told you, with the -- with regard to the missions, and with -- to the churches, the middle of the 19th century sees an end to the optimism that here is a Christian people at home, and it's -- can by missions spre- -- spread. We saw the going back of the Mormons on all the previous churches and declaring that they had apostasized, and introducing Old Testament law, two incredible breaches of the line of progress; and in the case of Jason Lee, the abandonment of the whole missionary concept, you see, and the shifting -- going over to something of a secular and quite a-religious, un-denominational type of action.

This, therefore, I feel, is the result of the first hundred years of American -- -'s independence, that the churches in America reach the end of their tether. They can no longer believe na‹vely that what they took for granted--that America as a Christian country--is easily an article of export into the foreign world, or can easily be applied to the problems of this country by the Christian believers. More complicated.

Now what -- it is perhaps necessary now to add to these two examples a kind of survey as to the results of this disappointment, this disillusionment. If, as I think it is rightly -- right to say, after Jason Lee's death in the '40s, and after the Mormons, the na‹ve idea of an orthodox church expanding by missions and just growing, you see, has to be abandoned. You understand that the '40s of the 19th century were filled with forebodings, or with a realization of this end of the tether. And you -- many of you may have heard, without perhaps taking it sufficiently serious, that the '40s of the 19th century were days of great excitement about the end of the world. You may have heard of the Millerites, the people in Putney, Vermont, who knew the date on which the world would come to an end.

Anybody who has lived through the fall of France, and the fall of Germany, and the fall of the czar, and many other such falls, will side with the Millerites against you people who laugh at the idea of an end of the world. I think that the early Christians were absolutely right, that they knew that their end was coming, drawing to a close, unless they saved it, by the grace of God. The Christian Church has saved everything we have from antiquity today. Whether it's this college, or the reading of Plato or Aristotle, or the -- the hel- -- holding of the Olympic Games, that all -- only has been saved by the intervention of the Christians who believed in the end of this pagan world and survived it. And I think the sooner you know that the United States are a mortal institution, the easier you will save it from oblivion. All the people who say, "We'll never die," are quite sure to be forgotten tomorrow.

"The end of the world was long ago," is a very wonderful poem by Chesterton, which I recommend you highly, "The Ballad of the White Horse." That's the greatest English poem written in the last 50 years, in 1908, and anticipated the blitz, in a remarkable manner, of the Germans over London. And so it appeared in -- pieces in the London Times, during the blitz. It had been written -- it had been written 25 -- 30 years before.

"And the end of the world was long ago." That is, people who do not take the tragedy of their own country and its political fate so seriously, that they can tremble, and can survive this doom, have not understood what history is. History is a Virginia Reel in which you always pass through the consumption of one form, because you accept it as doom, and then build it up again. And this optimism today that everything is -- going to be better every day is so childish, that it of course must lead to the undoing of the -- of this country.

The prophets always warn that there must be a great calamity before the right direction can and -- any longer, you see, be -- again be obtained. That's very simple, I mean. Like any warning, I mean. We can go wrong, but then we have to return and give up this wrong, and turn in the right direction, like isolationism in the -- the '30s; it was perfectly legitimate at that time to say that unless America ga- -- abandoned isolationism, you see; it would be a very small power, indeed, in the future, you see, if it es- -- escaped from its role in the future. And there is an attempt, you see, in the '30s -- was made really to say, "Nothing can happen to us." And then something did happen, which was quite serious, after all. And that's a very small thing. In this country, you have been so excessively fortunate that the end of the world to you is something that you leave to the Latter-day Saints, and you leave it to the Adventists -- the Seventh-Day Adventists, and you leave it to the Jehovah's Witnesses. And I feel as long as you educated people laugh at these good men and women who feel that the end of the world is imminent, you betray their confid- -- their trust, and you betray your

role as the educated leaders of this community. The educated people have to see the signs of the times before the uneducated. But you sit there and go to the movies.

This is not a behavior for people who -- who have at this moment such a tremendous task to fulfill, to rescue the world from the Third World War, which of course is still in the cards. I mean, we don't know why it is one way or the other. Nobody can say it will not happen, and nobody say it must happen. It's just ambiguous; it's in between. But if you are trying to build up this -- this life on a credit plan, for every trip around the world, obviously there will be a Third World War, because the prosperity of this country is just overstrained. I mean, the excesses in the living standard here lead to war.

The general of the army, Mr. Taylor, had to go on his knees before the Daughters of the American Revolution to di- -- convince them that -- that the people who rescued us--England, for example, in -- between 1939 and '41--that they of course deserve to be treated as part of our commonwealth, and that this mutual aid was not foreign aid. But all the -- the people here think that this is nibbling off our wealth. But just -- this wealth -- as I told you, property is not a question of peacetime only. It is only property if the wall, you see, around it is, so to speak, made secure. The walls around it. There you have a good example where prosperity, you see, is meaningless unless you have the means to -- to enforce it.

And I feel we are therefore not -- just on the brink of war, without or with Mr. Dulles. It makes no difference.

The -- Millerites then bring home to you this question that today it is impossible, it seems, to arouse the serious American for this very simple question: are we allowed to last? Do we deserve to last? Aren't we just a showpiece of exhibitionism and cruelty that should go under? This question of -- of Mr. Jeffers- -- Robinson Jeffers, "Sink, Perishing Republic," you see -- he's after all the greatest living poet of America. A strange man. He's very cruel. But certainly this -- this verse is remarkable, you see. It's desperately serious. And it is not made unwritten because you don't read it. Prophets are never read by the people who perish.

I mean, the -- but still -- in -- by what do you recognize prophecy, gentlemen? Because -- it -- the prophet is the only man in his own time who is remembered afterwards. And all his contemporaries are forgotten. You only know Isaiah and Jeremiah, and you don't know the king who lived in his own days. And nobody else. And therefore, I -- I'm afraid Mr. Robinson Jeffers may be the only name to be recalled in our own days, because he's the only man who sees

that this is a mort- -- as all human institutions, that if we do not pay the price for the future, you see, we cannot go through this eye of the needle by which the future is created.

So this is Millerite-ism, and therefore, when it got lost, and went over to the small people only, I think something has happened to all our churches. They are rather shallow today, and boring, because you cannot go to a decent church of educated people and hear the end of the world expected. But the creation of the world is not more of a miracle than the end of the world, the judgment of the world. It's one and the same problem. Anything that has been begun, can now end.

As you see.