The man-mob conception of God seemed very absurd to him. For man had formed it in the days when he still believed the earth to be flat, and had subsequently seen no good reason or obligation to change it. The man-mob had never gone beyond the idea that God was a definite person to whom certain things like praise and toadying were infinitely agreeable, and to whom certain other things like being happy and not very serious were as a red rag to a bull. This conception was the work of certain men who, the moment they had conceived a God in their own narrow and intolerant image, became themselves godlike. To men of that stamp simple and practical discoveries in geography, mechanics, or ceramics would have been utterly out of the question. But the greatest discovery of all with its precise descriptions and limitations lay to their credit. And from that time to this no very great number of men had ever taken the trouble to gainsay them, or ever would. “I never did, for one,” thought Derrick, and he recalled with a smile the religious phases through which he had passed in his earth life. As he remembered that he had once, for a short period of his childhood, believed in the fiery, old-fashioned Hell of the Puritans, the smile broadened, and he burst into joyous and musical laughter. III There was one thing that he must be prepared to face. His wife and their three children would _look_ just as they had looked when he last saw them, and as a matter of fact they would _be_ just what they were; but to him, with all his new and accurate knowledge and his inconceivably clear vision, they would seem to have changed greatly. He had always considered his wife an intelligent, well-educated, even an advanced woman, and he had considered his children, especially the youngest, who was a girl, altogether brighter and more precocious than his neighbour’s children. Well, along those lines he must be prepared for shocks and disillusionment. It would not be possible, for instance, to sit down with his wife to a rational discussion of anything. She would seem like a moron to him: superstitious, backward, ignorant, and stubborn as a mule. He would find her erroneous beliefs and convictions hard to change. It would be the same with the children, but in less degree. The oldest was twelve, and his brain was still capable of a little development. He would have some inclination to listen to his father and to believe what his father told him. With Sammy aged ten, and Ethel, aged eight, much might be done. He would begin by asking these young hopefuls to forget everything that had been taught them, with the exception of that one startling fact, that the world is round. He would then proceed to feed their eager young earth minds on as many simple and helpful truths as would be good for them, and he would show them, what was now so clear to him, how to find happiness on earth with a minimum of labour and worry.