She went on to point out that its author, whose name I have forgotten along with the title of the book, had been a successful minister—at least one might judge him so by usual standards. He had managed a large New York congregation, kept the church in repair, and collected substantial sums of money for worthy causes. But after his retirement he had reached the conclusion that his ministry had been a complete failure. Lacking faith in religion, because he had not been able to reconcile the Christian Gospel with his reasoned analysis of it, he had failed in his spiritual leadership. Deep concern over this had caused him to restudy the Gospels and especially the history of their composition; and he had concluded that in the interim between the death of the Apostles and the compilation of the Gospels, numerous additions might have been made and certain beliefs carried over from earlier faiths might have been interlarded into the basic concept of the Christian idea. He had therefore set about to delete from the Gospels, as recorded, all the inconsistencies with the Gospel as he thought it must have been preached, and had emerged with a kernel so dazzling and completely credible to the rational mind that he had become convinced that it must have been divinely inspired. For no one man nor group of men could possibly have conceived a faith so wholly consistent and so inspiring as had Jesus Christ himself. The very idea of individual dignity had brought men conviction that they were not meant to be slaves but responsible children of God. With that conviction, human liberty was born. And human liberty was not just a pleasant material situation but the world’s most vital, dynamic, and constructive spiritual force. To cast off the rule of tyrants men must only be governed by God. As the commandant’s lady finished her review, she handed her book over to me. “Since we’ve been on duty down here,” she said simply, “we’ve come to sense the semireligious fervor with which the lads approach their flying. The hazards seem but to lift up their spirits, for while physically the airplane is mechanical, yet the art of flying has the flavor of high destiny.” She paused and glanced quickly at her husband as if for support. “We haven’t succeeded in crystallizing the idea,” said the admiral, “but even as professional military people we keep groping for the philosophical import of this new device. The thing is potentially so destructive that unless we find some way, through the spirit, to adapt it to constructive uses, it will surely destroy us.” For a while we three sat silent before the fire. Brooks Upham had expressed the unease that lies heavy on the hearts of military men; they dislike the business of destruction.