We cannot compromise with these vestiges of the ancient order. Whatever we retain of them will come back to life and grow again. It is no good to operate for cancer unless the whole growth is removed. Leave a crown about and presently you will find it being worn by someone resolved to be a king. Keep the name and image of a god without a distinct museum label and sooner or later you will discover a worshipper on his knees to it and be lucky not to find a human sacrifice upon the altar. Wave a flag and it will wrap about you. Of yourself even more than of the community is this true; there can be no half measures. You have not yet completed your escape to the Open Conspiracy from the cities of the plain while it is still possible for you to take a single backward glance. And at last when we conceive that we have given ourselves altogether to the Open Conspiracy frustration may overtake us. Then it is, when we are assured that we are possessed by the Open Conspiracy, that we shall be most disposed to think and act as though we possessed the Open Conspiracy. And if we have made sacrifices, if we are conscious of substantial success, then still more shall we be in danger. One of the most disagreeable features of Christian hagiology is the value set by the blessed saints upon their special privileges. The poor souls loved to think they had caught the peculiar attention of God by their sores and mortifications. This “weakness of the eminent claim” pervades all religions. Most of those who will serve the Open Conspiracy will be tempted to think they have deserved well and to compare their merits and their share of influence and recognition in the movement with those of others. The Open Conspiracy will be no more free from rivalries, heartburnings, distrust, touchy suspicions, mutual interference and disingenuous negligences, than any other great human co-operation. The disciplines, the trainings and methods of organisation that must be evolved as the movement grows may be effective in restricting the mischief of such humanities; they will certainly not suppress them altogether. Many a good and serviceable man may die embittered by the preoccupation of his fellow workers in this huge campaign. But the Open Conspiracy will grow as science grows, greater at last than all its outer antagonisms, than ancient tradition or instinctive resistance, greater than the conscious or unconscious disloyalties of its adherents, greater than all the present vices of mankind. * * * * *