We were just twenty-four hours making our journey around the world, when
suddenly I found myself once more gazing into the beautiful eyes of
Arletta. While she bestowed a kindly look of sympathy toward me, her
features plainly showed that her gentle nature had received an awful
shock from the terrible and degrading sights we had witnessed. And there
was much reason why this pure and lovable woman should be shocked at
what we had seen, for even I, a worthless and hardened vagabond, had
become thoroughly disgusted with my own species.
"And what do you think of your highly civilized people now?" she
inquired sadly. "They are a race of tail-less monkeys and filthy beasts
with myself included," responded I, with vehemence, and then I began a
tirade of abuse against the entire human family.
"Stop," exclaimed Arletta, "you must not allow malice to enter your mind
against any living creature, no matter how beastly or brutal it may be.
Hatred will not make the world better; it needs love. No living being is
responsible for what it is any more than you or I are accountable for
being in existence. But while each individual inherits the good or bad
instincts of its predecessor, still it has the power to make better or
worse its own condition. Love will not only make better your own
condition, but that of your fellow beings as well. Do not expect to find
in others that which you do not possess yourself. It is your duty to set
a good example, not wait for others to accomplish what you have not done
yourself. So begin right now with love. Cast away all unkind thoughts
and never allow another to enter your mind, no matter what the
provocation might be. I admit that the Apeman of today is no better, in
fact, in many respects is much inferior to the Apeman who lived over
four thousand years ago, but that is because he took the wrong road in
trying to reach real manhood. He is still on the wrong path, but must be
turned about and started in the right direction. He must be taught that
Heaven is here on earth, if he will only make it so. But the earth will
never be a paradise, so long as he allows a grain of selfishness to
remain in his system. In yonder picture you can see what real men were
like. Study their countenances carefully and see if you can read that
any one of them ever committed a selfish act or even permitted an unkind
thought to enter his mind, for if he had, you could plainly read it from
his features, the face being the mirror of our thoughts and actions, and
no matter what we do or what we think from the time we are born until we
die, every act and thought is indelibly stamped upon our faces and can
never be erased until the material of which we are composed has
disintegrated and reentered the great chemical basin from which all
living things receive their matter and energy. And it is to be hoped
that with each turn of the chemical wheel the succeeding generation will
be re-moulded on a better scale, until the Apeman and all lower animals
have passed through a successful course of evolution and finally emerge
into real manhood--the highest type of earthly beings. This goal is but
a few steps and within the power of the Apeman to reach, but he must
take his steps in the right direction. A whole nation of those
magnificent beings you see in the picture, once existed in real life.
Their ancestors were Apemen who were started in the right path, and
after persistently sticking to the upward march of unselfish progress
for many generations, ultimately reached the class of men you see before
you; giants, physically, mentally and morally." And here she paused and
looked long and affectionately at those wonderful figures in the
painting. Then a feeling of intense jealousy suddenly crept into my
brain, and I thought I would surely go mad under its terrible pressure.
Arletta was in love with one of those real men, while she held merely a
compassionate feeling for me.
I, the Apeman, standing six feet two inches in height and weighing over
two hundred pounds avoirdupois, heretofore regarded as a marvel in
physical development, now, in the presence of these eight-foot giants,
felt like a shrunken pigmy. Formerly it was generally conceded that I
was a rather handsome fellow. This woman thought I was hideous.
Previously, I had felt proud of my nicely curled heavy black mustache,
now I thought it made me look like a monkey. The splendid features of
the real men were not disfigured by a hair or blemish of any kind, while
their skin was as soft and smooth as that of a new born child. During my
trip around the world, I had observed that the more man's body was
covered by hair, the more ape-like he appeared, especially when
decorating his face with it, and I was certain that my appearance was
just as ludicrous in the eyes of Arletta as those I had seen. Therefore
my admiration for the stately objects portrayed in the picture was
beginning to turn into hatred. I inwardly wished they were alive that I
might have an opportunity to combat with one or all of them in order to
show Arletta that I possessed the courage to fight until death for her
love. While lost in the midst of such reflections Arletta turned her
gaze upon me fixedly and said: "What barbaric thoughts have you
permitted to enter your mind now?" "I was wishing," replied I rather
sullenly, "that the man you love in that picture was alive, that I might
have the chance to demonstrate my worth in a fight to secure your favor;
perhaps, then, you would discover that I had some good qualities."
"And do you suppose if I saw you fighting like a savage bulldog that I
would admire those brutish tendencies in your nature?" inquired she. "Do
you think that the animal instincts of fighting and killing are good
qualities to possess? Has your trip around the world borne no good
results? You have observed that your own species, like other savage
beasts, quarrel, fight, maim and kill each other through selfish
motives, and you have condemned them for it; now you would continue to
do the very same thing yourself and think that I would consider it
courageous. According to one of our primitive laws, the courageous man
was he who feared no one and caused no one to fear him. These men of the
picture were the bravest of the brave, and still if one of them were
alive today he would not fight with you, no matter how much you might
ill use him, for he would know that it required more real strength to
take abuse than to give it. He would suffer more pain if he hurt you
than if you injured him. And still he could have crushed you with
greater ease than a cat can a mouse, if he were cowardly enough to do
it. That is the real courage of unselfishness--the kind your species
cannot understand. Your fellow beings applaud cowardice which they
mistake for strength of character. They seem unable to comprehend that
it requires far more courage to suffer pain than to inflict it upon
others. They have inherited their erroneous ideas from the wild beasts
who preceded them, and at the present time few of them know any better.
But they must be taught differently and the teachers must set the
examples, not merely offer advice. The different countries of the world
today support large armies of licensed murderers who are commonly called
soldiers. They are sent to the battle-fields to slaughter each other for
selfish purposes. The strongest side is naturally victorious, and after
killing as many of their adversaries as possible, return home to receive
the applause and admiration of their countrymen. They are considered
heroic because they were successful in slaying their weaker opponents.
Your society worships these human butchers and the more lives one of
them has destroyed the bigger the monument is erected in his honor. How
many of these butchers would have the courage to take an insult from a
weaker party without resenting it? It requires great bravery for the
strong to refrain from taking advantage of the weak; it demands real
heroism for the strong to equally share the results of their labors with
the feeble. For the strong are doubly blessed in having strength while
the weak are unfortunate and need sympathy."
"Would it not be courageous for one person to die for the love of
another?" inquired I.
"That would depend altogether upon the circumstances," replied Arletta.
"It would require far more courage to sacrifice your life for one you
did not love as there would then be no selfish motive behind it. As I
understand your feelings, you love me and imagine that you would not
care to live without me."
"Yes," said I fervently, "I shall take my own life sooner than leave
you."
"That is not courage at all, it is simply cowardice," answered she.
"Through your own selfishness in trying to obtain something beyond your
reach, you lack the strength to live without it. It takes far more
courage to live when you want to die than to die when you want to live.
Unselfishness is the very highest type of courageousness and one must
live for the good he may do the world instead of his own personal
aggrandizement. Thousands of our noble men sacrificed their lives yearly
for the good of the world. Our laws permitted a certain number of them
to leave their heavenly country periodically to go among the Apemen, and
try and teach these barbarians the meaning of unselfish love. They never
returned. They fully realized before starting on these missionary trips,
that they were depriving themselves of all the luxuries the earth
provided for a life of hardship and suffering; a life of insults and all
the cruel tortures the ferocious Apemen could inflict upon them. But it
pleased them to know that they possessed the courage to withstand all
the insults heaped upon them, while trying to alleviate the conditions
of others. Unlike your present missionaries they did not go into
different countries backed up by loaded guns ready to annihilate all who
did not believe their doctrines. If you hit a man on the head with a
club and then tell him that you love him he will not believe you. They
understood that to teach the Apemen to love one another they must set
themselves up as examples, not with mere words, but by unselfish and
courageous acts. They also knew that they had no divine right to enter
another country and force upon the inhabitants their laws and customs.
They merely went to teach their methods and in trying to do good for
others were willing to accept insults in return for their kindness in
order to prove their sincerity of purpose.
"At first, these good men were looked upon as gods by the Apemen who
wished to worship them as such, and had they been vain-glorious like the
Apeman himself, they would have allowed this false idea to exist. But
no, there was not a grain of vanity or selfishness in their systems.
They had not left their homes and friends to be worshiped, but had gone
away to show the Apeman how he might reach real manhood, if he would but
follow their instructions. They taught the eradication of selfishness
from all living beings and the abolition of the system of individual
accumulation, practiced then and now by all of your species. Of course
when the rich and religious rulers of the different tribes and nations
learned that these men were teaching that all living beings should have
an equal chance in life, and that the weak should enjoy the same
comforts as the strong, and that their divine right laws were unjust,
they became wroth and ordered our men to be put to death by the most
cruel methods. Some were burned at the stake; others were buried alive;
several were put into dungeons and their bodies allowed to rot; many
were cast into fiery furnaces, while a number of them were thrown into
dens containing lions and tigers. All these tortures and innumerable
others, did these brave men suffer that they might impress upon the
Apeman the real meaning of courage and unselfishness. And through the
power of mind sight we used to see these heroic volunteers unflinchingly
suffer these indignities for the cause of righteousness, notwithstanding
we had the power to annihilate the entire Apeman species, if we had so
desired. Our chemists could have turned on currents of poisonous air and
asphyxiated whole nations of them at once; our electricians could have
sent an electric shock around the earth that would have left a path of
destruction a thousand miles in width; our scientists could have
concentrated the full force of the sun's rays upon any particular city
they might choose and burn it up instantly; but they did not. We had the
power to destroy, but the courage of forbearance. The highest honor our
nation could bestow upon a man was to allow him to leave his heavenly
country and become a martyr to his own unselfishness in trying to uplift
the Apeman species. And had it not been for the unfortunate catastrophe
which I shall explain to you later, our plans would have succeeded and
the earth today would have been heaven with no such creature in
existence as the Apeman."