32
the time I was genuinely sorry for the animal; I simply forced myself to carry out the experiment in 
the interest of pure science. 
The combination of innocence, ignorance, knowledge, ingenuity and high moral principle seems 
extraordinary. It is evident that the insanely immoral superstition in which I had been brought up as 
responsible for so atrocious an absurdity. Again and again we shall see how the imposition of the 
antinatural theory and principles of Christianity upon a peculiarly sane, matter-of-fact, reality-
facing genius created a conflict whose solution was expressed on the material plane by some 
extravagant action. My mind is severely logical; or, rather, it was so until mystic experience 
enabled it to shake off its fetters. Logic is responsible for most of the absurd and abominable deeds 
which have disgraced history. Given Christian premisses, the Inquisition was acting in accordance 
with the highest humanitarian principles in destroying a man's body to save his soul. The followers 
of Descartes were right to torture animals, believing them to be automata. Genuine determinists 
would be justified in committing any crime, since the fact of its occurrence would prove that it was 
unavoidable. Huxley, in Evolution and Ethics, makes out a very poor case against infanticide and 
race suicide. We are constantly using our judgment to preserve one section of humanity as against 
another; we are in fact constantly compelled to do so. As for the future of humanity, the certainty 
of final extermination when the planet becomes uninhabitable makes all human endeavour a 
colossal fatuity. 
It is one of the principal theses of this book to show the above statement to be absurd, by offering a 
theory of realty compatible with sanity. 
However, that comes later. 
 
1. Oxford was anathema maranatha to my Uncle Tom. Keble! Manning!! 
Newman!!! Procurers to the lords of hell far subtler and more fearful 
than Darwin, Huxley and Tyndall.  
2. One might surely argue that His most generous device was the adaptation 
of tobacco to the nerves of taste and smell.  
 
 
 
7 
"The best laid plans of mice and men gang aft agley." Even so cunning a combination of rat and ape 
as my Uncle Tom made occasional mistakes, and one of these was very fortunate for me. He 
engaged a tutor names Archibald Douglas, an Oxford man who had purged that offence by having 
travelled for the Bible Society across Persia. If my uncle had ever heard of George Borrow, he might 
have saved himself much trouble; and I might have been driven insane. It was in the spring of '91. I 
had recovered from a bad attack of whooping-cough. The idea was that we should bicycle down to 
Torquay, but on reaching Gildford I was too ill to ride further and we went down by train. Though 
Douglas called himself a Christian, he proved to be both a man and a gentleman. I presume that 
poverty had compelled the camouflage. From the moment that we were alone together he produced 
a complete revolution in my outlook upon life, by showing me for the first time a sane, clean jolly 
world worth living in. Smoking and drinking were natural. He warned me of the dangers of excess 
from the athletic standpoint. He introduced me to racing, billiards, betting, cards and women. He 
told me how these things might be enjoyed without damaging oneself or wronging others. He put 
me up to all the tricks. He showed me the meaning of honour. I immediately accepted his 
standpoint and began to behave like a normal, healthy human being. The nightmare world of 
Christianity vanished at the dawn. I fell in with a girl of the theatre in the first ten days at Torquay, 
and at that touch of human love the detestable mysteries of sex were transformed into joy and 
beauty. The obsession of sin fell from my shoulders into the sea of oblivion. I had been almost 
overwhelmed by the appalling responsibility of ensuring my own damnation and helping others to