Horace. (Staggering to his feet and about to rush at Messenger) Hullo! I’ll not stand for this! Get out of my——
(Messenger raises his arm and Horace receives an electric shock which reels him back into his chair. The furniture may be arranged to shake and rock about as if under the same influence. Messenger refrains and Horace slowly recovers himself.)
Messenger. Are you properly impressed, or shall I——?
Horace. No, no! Don’t do it again, please! It hurts!
Messenger. Good! Now listen with heart and mind. You have learnt that Mars has a planetary lifetime brief compared with Earth, and yet we Martians are to you as are you to the cattle that you breed.
Horace. As bad as that?
Messenger. Triflers of Time, learn the cause. Self—Self is the Miasm of the world you live in; a soul plague blotching Earth’s body over with its petty spites, outraged homes, labor riots, revolutions, civil wars, carnivals of blood, marring the Grand Purpose. No war has ever wasted Mars, nor could it. There have been no rushings back, no buried epochs, no sleeping centuries, for Self was unmasked at the beginning.
Horace. Mask? What mask?
Messenger. Self wears a thousand, making a counterfeit of every virtue. The soldier’s glory, the painter’s touch, the statesman’s aim, the poet’s dream hide something still of self behind them. Even your children are becoming egoists—the saddest sign of all.
Horace. Very sad and quite true, but why tell me all this?