special
train to his identity, and go wheresoever he will whensoever he pleases, is more
highly organized than he who, should he wish for the same power, might wish for
the wings of a bird with an equal chance of getting them; and whose legs are his
only means of locomotion? That old philosophic enemy matter, the inherently and
essentially evil, still hangs about the neck of the poor and strangles him; but
to the rich, matter is immaterial; the elaborate organization of his
extra-corporeal system has freed his soul.
    This is the secret of the homage which we see rich men receive from those
who are poorer than themselves; it would be a grave error to suppose that this
deference proceeds from motives which we need be ashamed of; it is the natural
respect which all living creatures pay to those whom they recognize as higher
than themselves in the scale of animal life, and is analogous to the veneration
which a dog feels for man. Among savage races it is deemed highly honourable to
be the possessor of a gun, and throughout all known time there has been a
feeling that those who are worth most are the worthiest.«
    And so he went on at considerable length, attempting to show what changes in
the distribution of animal and vegetable life throughout the kingdom had been
caused by this and that of man's inventions, and in what way each was connected
with the moral and intellectual development of the human species; he even
allotted to some the share which they had had in the creation and modification
of man's body, and that which they would hereafter have in its destruction; but
the other writer was considered to have the best of it, and in the end succeeded
in destroying all the inventions that had been discovered for the preceding 271
years, a period which was agreed upon by all parties after several years of
wrangling as to whether a certain kind of mangle which was much in use among
washerwomen should be saved or no. It was at last ruled to be dangerous, and was
just excluded by the limit of 271 years. Then came the reactionary civil wars
which nearly ruined the country, but which it would be beyond my present scope
to describe.
 

                               Chapter Twenty-Six

                       The Views of an Erewhonian Prophet

                        Concerning the Rights of Animals

It will be seen from the foregoing chapters that the Erewhonians are a meek and
long-suffering people, easily led by the nose, and quick to offer up common
sense at the shrine of logic, when a philosopher arises among them, who carries
them away through his reputation for especial learning, or by convincing them
that