The day may come when we will have to admit that he is our very self. We have the superiority complex. Which of course is nothing but a confession that we are inferior. And in allowing restriction after restriction to be put upon us, how, in the name of common sense and in the words of the man in the street, do we get that way? We are the most governed people in the world today. There are plenty of laws, but little order; and the millennium that the Prohibitionists promised with the adoption of the Eighteenth Amendment is farther away than ever. Let us wake up, and face conditions as they are. Let us not try to delude ourselves into a state of false happiness, when, at heart, we are the most unhappy nation now breathing the celebrated air. It is high time we did some solemn thinking. The writing is on the wall. It is our business to read the words inscribed there in letters of fire. CHAPTER II OUR GREAT UNHAPPINESS Are the American people any worse than other people, that they should be put _en masse_ upon the water-wagon? Who is it that sits in judgment over them? What unseen Kaiser, Czar, autocrat passes sentence upon their morals? We fought a War to get rid of such leaders and rulers; and now, ironically enough, we find ourselves under the domination of far stronger task-masters. I have recently been traveling through a great portion of this great country. Everywhere I found a curious unhappiness. People may not be articulate about their sorrows, just as the poor may not speak of their poverty; yet the canker is there, the worm i’ the bud is eating away the heart of the flower. Perhaps I should use the word discontent rather than unhappiness. Or restlessness. Or resentment. At any rate, the feeling, whatever it is, exists; and there is a new menace over our days. The placid reformers, resting between reforms, smack their lips in sadistic glee. In the face of repeated and open violations of the law, they give out interviews to the effect that all is moving serenely; that the people are under beautiful control--though they have to admit that they squirm once in a while. Here again it is a case of stupid optimism. They _want_ all to be well, and they fondly imagine that all _is_ well. They will have a great awakening; for this smoldering discontent and anger is bound to rise in a great tide one of these days. [Illustration: At the trial, the package in evidence was placed on a large green-covered table, in the presence of the jury and the court. The prosecuting attorney worked himself into a fine fury of eloquence. The majesty of the law must be upheld.] Listen to a lady reformer in Chicago, speaking after a church league meeting, in September, 1922. Evidently she is out of touch with the world, secure in the sanctity of a liquorless home. She has never attended a real dinner-party, poor dear; and somehow my heart goes out to her.