omnipresence and
omnipotence of it are not without divine significance. For can you not
see that this Cash Register, this Pix of Trade, is prominently set up
on the altar of every institution, political, moral, social, and
religious? Do you not meet with it everywhere, and foremost in the
sanctuaries of the mind and the soul? In the Societies for the
Diffusion of Knowledge; in the Social Reform Propagandas; in the Don't
Worry Circles of Metaphysical Gymnasiums; in Alliances, Philanthropic,
Educational; in the Board of Foreign Missions; in the Sacrarium of
Vaticinatress Eddy; in the Church of God itself;--is not the Cash
Register a divine symbol of the _credo_, the faith, or the idea?

"To trade, or not to trade," Hamlet-Khalid exclaims, "that is the
question: whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer, etc., or to take
arms against the Cash Registers of America, and by opposing end--"
What? Sacrilegious wretch, would you set your face against the
divinity in the Holy Pix of Trade? And what will you end, and how will
You end by it? An eternal problem, this, of opposing and ending. But
before you set your face in earnest, we would ask you to consider if
the vacancy or chaos which is sure to follow, be not more pernicious
than what you would end. If you are sure it is not, go ahead, and we
give you Godspeed. If you have the least doubt about it--but Khalid is
incapable now of doubting anything. And whether he opposes his theory
of immanent morality to the Cash Register, or to Democracy, or to the
ruling powers of Flunkeydom, we hope He will end well. Such is the
penalty of revolt against the dominating spirit of one's people and
ancestors, that only once in a generation is it attempted, and
scarcely with much success. In fact, the first who revolts must
perish, the second, too, and the third, and the fourth, until, in the
course of time and by dint of repetition and resistance, the new
species of the race can overcome the forces of environment and the
crushing influence of conformity. This, we know, is the biological
law, and Khalid must suffer under it. For, as far as our knowledge
extends, he is the first Syrian, the ancient Lebanon monks excepted,
who revolted against the ruling spirit of his people and the dominant
tendencies of the times, both in his native and his adopted
Countries.

Yes, the _ethos_ of the Syrians (for once we use Khalid's philosophic
term), like that of the Americans, is essentially money-seeking.