'Last Sunday evening,' went on the bald man, speaking very rapidly and walking up and down the room in his excitement, 'I went to a church situated in a mean street, surrounded by closes that each holds the population of a sparse parish. A tattered bill on the door proclaimed the traffic in seats. There seemed to be no demand. There were only eighteen present. A cheap church, with varnished pews, that could hold a thousand--and only eighteen there--old people and two or three children--none who could lay hold on life with both hands. To that handful a discouraged and hopeless preacher proclaimed the evangel of the love of God ... but his voice died in the disconsolate and empty spaces.... But when I came out, there in an open space were massed thousands of men, and the air throbbed with vitality as they listened to an orator denouncing capital and proclaiming the coming of the new day when every man could have his heart's desire--money and more money.... Eighteen at the church where the salt had lost its savour, and thousands where the chaff of worldliness was the only bread served to perishing souls.' 'But you must remember that there were some churches quite full in the city that evening,' I interjected. 'Quite so,' resumed the bald man, 'but who were they that filled them? Only the one class that has still kept its hold on the seriousness and the duty of life--the middle class--the one layer of health in the nation.' 'You forget,' I protested, 'that the other two classes have proved that they know how to die.' He came to a sudden halt, and his tripping sentences suddenly stopped. 'Yes,' he answered, 'they know how to die; but what is the use of knowing how to die if they do not know how to live?' IV 'What is the use of facing death,' went on the bald man, resuming his walk up and down, and pointing now and again an accusing finger, 'if death does not teach the way of life? Through death we conquered the greatest tyranny that ever threatened the world, but the enemy has really been the victor, for the spirit of the enemy has now conquered us. That spirit is the covetousness that knows no law but force. It does not matter whether the goal aimed at be the hegemony of the world or more and more of gold--the spirit is the same. And now it has seized us. There is the profiteer living on the results of other men's industry and fattening on the plunder of the public--his god is covetousness. There are the millions who are ready to march over the ruins of the Empire, careless of the sufferings of others if only they will get their demands on the world. Nobody realises the futility of gaining the world and losing the life. Eighteen in church and thousands out for their share of the world.... It is covetousness triumphant.'