now it definitely, that his life is
partial. He is driven to join himself on. He obeys decision and the
appearance of strength as a horse obeys its rider's voice. One thinks
of the pride, the uncontrolled frantic will of this black ape of all
Emperors, and one forgets the universal docility that made him possible.
Usurpation is a crime to which men are tempted by human dirigibility.
It is the orderly peoples who create tyrants, and it is not so much
restraint above as stiff insubordination below that has to be taught to
men. There are kings and tyrannies and imperialisms, simply because of
the unkingliness of men.

And as he sat upon the battlements of La Ferriere, Benham cast off from
his mind his last tolerance for earthly kings and existing States, and
expounded to another human being for the first time this long-cherished
doctrine of his of the Invisible King who is the lord of human destiny,
the spirit of nobility, who will one day take the sceptre and rule the
earth.... To the young American's naive American response to any simply
felt emotion, he seemed with his white earnestness and his glowing eyes
a veritable prophet....

"This is the root idea of aristocracy," said Benham.

"I have never heard the underlying spirit of democracy, the real true
Thing in democracy, so thoroughly expressed," said the young American.

5

Benham's notes on race and racial cultures gave White tantalizing
glimpses of a number of picturesque experiences. The adventure in Kieff
had first roused Benham to the reality of racial quality. He was caught
in the wheels of a pogrom.

"Before that time I had been disposed to minimize and deny race. I still
think it need not prevent men from the completest social co-operation,
but I see now better than I did how difficult it is for any man to purge
from his mind the idea that he is not primarily a Jew, a Teuton, or a
Kelt, but a man. You can persuade any one in five minutes that he or she
belongs to some special and blessed and privileged sort of human
being; it takes a lifetime to destroy that persuasion. There are these
confounded differences of colour, of eye and brow, of nose or hair,
small differences in themselves except that they give a foothold and
foundation for tremendous fortifications of prejudice and tradition, in
which hostilities and hatreds may gather. When I think of a Jew's nose,
a Chinaman's eyes or a negro's colour I am reminded of that fatal little
pit which nat