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CHAPTER XII.
ANALYSIS OF MORMON SOCIETY.
Difficulty at the outset - Extremes among witnesses - Prejudice on both sides - First impressions favorable - "Whited Sepulchres" - Classes of Mormons - Brigham Young; impostor or fanatic? - The dishonest class - The "earnest Mormons" - Disloyalty - Church and State - Killing men to save their souls - Slavery of women - Brigham the government - Prophecy against the United States - "War" - "Seven women to take hold of one man" - Another war expected - Blood and thunder in store for the "Gentiles" - "The great tribulation" about due - Popular errors - Witchcraft - "Faith-doctoring" - Zion, in Jackson County, Missouri - Comfortable prospect.
BEFORE entering upon a subject so complex as Mormon society and theology, it is necessary to warn the reader that on many of its features it is difficult to write without some warmth of feeling; and as to polygamy, quite impossible to treat thereon without coarseness. In this part of my work too, a special preface is appropriate, as our American-Saxon is particularly deficient in those delicate euphemisms which enable an author to describe that which is vile, in language which is comparatively chaste, or at any rate, not shocking or offensive. In treating of the gross materialism and perverted sexualism of the Mormons, it has been thought best to speak plainly, that the full effects of this new Mohammedanism may be seen and read of all men.
A serious difficulty meets us at the very outset of an examination into the affairs of Utah. The fair-minded Gentile, who really desires to know the truth, must in effect, resolve himself into a perambulating jury of one, to try every fact presented by the strictest rules of legal acumen. He will find three different accounts of, three separate reasons for, and three opposite deductions from every possible occurrence, viz.: the Mormon account wholly presumed and one-sided; the bitter anti-Mormon account which would condemn all of an opposite creed without distinction, and the account of the moderate Gentiles, who are in the best position to give a fair judgment, but being necessarily distrusted by both the other parties, are in a poor way to get at facts.
Two classes of writers have dealt with the Mormon question; the one has described in glowing terms the simple earnestness of the people, their devotion to an idea, their faithfulness to their leaders, their industry, frugality, temperance, and love of home; the other has painted, in dark colors, their horrible crimes, their lustful and debasing doctrines their depravity, treachery, disloyalty, petty tyranny and social meanness. Paradoxical as it may appear, there is a measure of truth on both sides; thousands of the Mormon laity, ignorant, zealous and sincere, have many of the virtues claimed for them, while the gang of licentious villains who mould this pliable mass, are guilty of tenfold more crimes than the world will ever know. In all descriptions of life and manners in Utah, this distinction is to be carefully kept in mind. It is a noteworthy fact, too, that visitors who reach Salt Lake City with no decided feelings either way, nearly always form a more favorable opinion at first. than they have after a few months' residence. I was slow in arriving at the reasons for this, but there are good ones.
Men of quiet tastes arrive there from some border towns, where the offscourings of Christendom are gathered, and the apparent change strikes them with great force. They are charmed with the quiet and order and beauty that seem to prevail on every hand, and in all conversations it is carefully impressed upon their minds, that all this is the result of Brighamism and the institutions set up under it. Much more is claimed than is true, and the visitor finding things better than he expected, is led to believe them better than they really are. But as he progresses in knowledge, his views of this vaunted "quiet, and order, and beauty," begin to change. He finds that this quiet is the quiet of despotism-this order is of the kind that "reigned in Warsaw" on a certain historic occasion, when the heel of the tyrant was on fifty thousand necks, and to murmur was to be crushed.
He finds that the beauty is mostly of nature's making, and as to the boasted virtue and honesty, it is about like that of other similar communities-good, bad and indifferent. There ought to be virtue in a community where no man is introduced to a woman until he has been thoroughly tested, and where the "dagger to the heart" is the openly avowed penalty for the slightest infraction; and yet such are the defects of their social system that, despite these dread penalties, virtue is not secured. Public prostitution is, of course, comparatively unknown, but that private immorality, and that of the most loathsome character, prevails extensively, is well known to all who care to inquire; and is often flatly acknowledged by their own speakers, one of whom said, in a public sermon, that he could not preserve his own honor, "couldn't trust his women out of his sight, and was bound to have'em all in one house, under his own eye." The resident finally learns these facts, and learns, too, that things he considers gross crimes are practiced under the name of religion.
Then a reaction begins in his mind, and anger is excited more fiercely against crimes concealed in the name of religion, than those which appear in true colors. And this is the crime of Brighamism, that a class of swindling fanatics can so put on the appearance of virtue as to deceive both those within and without, their followers and their visitors. At first, I thought I was alone in thus changing my views; but I find it to be the case, nine times out of ten, with the fair-minded Gentile. Look at the long list of visitors who have spoken or written, and it will generally be found, the shorter their stay, the more favorable their testimony. There is one point on which I long refused belief, the existence of "Danites" or "Destroying Angels." I looked upon them as rather a bug-a-boo of the Gentile mind. But the testimony is now unimpeachable. I find their existence avowed in Brigham's old sermons. I have met more than one man who had narrowly escaped from them with life. I have it from the statements of apostates, and more than all else, my personal friends among the Mormons themselves, have avowed and defended the order. To a young Mormon woman, who was laboring for my conversion, I said, in jest - "Do you believe in these Danites? Do you sustain such a man as Bill Hickman in his murders?' and, to my surprise, the reply was: "That is his office, to cut off those who violate a sacred obligation, for which there is no forgiveness. That is the law of God."
When a man finds growing within him a sentiment of hostility to a sect claiming to be religious, he does well to consider carefully the grounds of such feeling, lest early prejudice or sectarian bias be misleading him. Charges against religious bodies are to be received with caution, and examined with more than legal distrust. We do well to remember that the crimes of religious communities have been exaggerated in every age of the world, and hence extra caution is due to them in examining their history. In this spirit I can truly say I approached Mormonism; and when compelled to radically change my views of them, while I felt a natural chagrin at having been at first deceived, it was more in sorrow than in anger that I found myself disenchanted. And this has been the experience of the great majority who have made a lengthy residence in Utah. For a few weeks all seems right; but if any man flatters himself that at the end of six weeks he has seen more than the superficies of Mormon society, he is woefully deceived. When the first flush of curiosity had subsided I ceased hunting for information of those so falsely called "representative men;" I began to look among the people. I talked with the young, and extended my acquaintance among that class - most generally women - who have been wrecked in mind, body and estate by the maelstrom of lust and fanatical Jury, which is ever raging in the Mormon capital. It is not easy to get at these facts. The witnesses will not speak while there is the slightest doubt. They know not whom to trust, and one must take a decided stand, and become himself an object of hatred and distrust to the hierarchy, before he can safely be considered a friend to its victims. But when a man has fairly cut loose from the misrepresentations of the few, and begun to get the facts from the mass, every day the odious features of Mormonism rise into clearer view, till he stands aghast to think he ever had a good opinion of the system. The Mormon Church, or rather community, may be divided into four classes.
I. First are the leaders of all ranks, from the First Presidency down through all the grades of apostles, seventies, bishops, elders priests, evangelists, missionaries and teachers.
They are all bound to the Church by the strongest ties of self-interest, as by it they live - many of them in splendor and affluence. In such a state of facts, we may well question their sincerity, especially as some of them are men of keen analytical talents, and far-reaching sagacity. But whether they think it true or false, they must stand or fall with the system. Some of their evidently believe in it with all earnestness; others, as evidently do not. Their history and unguarded expressions show that. Still a third class seem doubtful, and to this it must be confessed Brigham Young belongs. Outsiders are strangely divided in opinion regarding him. His worst enemies, while they charge him with every crime in the code, yet often admit that he is sincere in his religious belief; "but," say they, "his religion admits of the most atrocious crimes, if done to further good interests!" Others look upon him as a heartless impostor, a sensual, deceitful tyrant, and this I find to be the common view among apostates, or recusant Mormons, who have suffered from his acts. I am inclined to regard him as that strange compound of impostor and fanatic, which history has shown to be possible, as in the cases of the Florentine, Savonarola and the Jesuit, Loyola. Incredible as it may appear to a mind and conscience yet undebauched, men may and actually do persuade themselves that they are doing God's service while committing the most heinous crimes, and
" Christians have burnt each other, quite persuaded
That all the Apostles would have done as they did."II The second class comprises those who have embraced Mormonism from unworthy-motives, and consists generally of men with no fixed sentiments on any subsect except their own self-interest. They are men who have been unfortunate or criminal in other communities, and fled to Mormonism for a refuge. Broken down merchants, professional men, without character, and the "bilks" and "dead beats" of other communities generally, who have been deceived by the representations of progress there, and expected to better themselves by casting in their fortunes with a rising sect. And from this class have originated many of the Mormon troubles, in times past. They often become dissatisfied and turbulent, and often apostatize, but have too little fixedness of sentiment, and too much dullness of moral perception to be of any value to either side. Some of them seek easy positions under the hierarchy; others, more desperate, sink lower, and become the mere tools of the leaders to do all their dirty and infamous work. Mutual guilt then makes them mutual spies, and conscious that their lives are in the power of their masters, they live as guilty and miserable slaves, with the assured knowledge that, at the slightest disloyal move, their lives will pay the forfeit. More than one of this class has met with a bloody death, from the simple fact that he knew too much, as I now know from undoubted testimony.
III. The third class consists of those who became Mormons sincerely, but from slight or insufficient motives. They united with the sect, with as much sincerity as they were capable of, but with no clear understanding of what was before them. Before embracing Mormonism, they were generally afloat on religious subjects, or dissatisfied with what they saw in their own churches, and had fallen into the dangerous habit of suspecting all men of hypocrisy who showed much zeal for morality. I have met dozens of this class who had been "lobby members" of the Methodist, Baptist, Presbyterian, and Campbellite Churches; that weak, feeble class of Christians who expect the church to pick them up and carry them to heaven, carefully lifting them over the rough places in the road, and removing every annoying doubt which will rise in an idle or rapid brain. I have heard them speak of their churches as "stationary," or "sleepy," never dreaming that the fault was in themselves. They were the weak, discontented disciples, without the fierce vigor and aggressive spirit of the true Church; not having learned the first principle of Christianity to be zealous, unselfish laborers. In this state of mind their attention is caught and fancy captivated by the claim of a new revelation, of holding direct communion with heaven, of walking every day in new light received from without; and also at thought of a distinctively American religion, with saints, apostles, prophets and martyrs, all of our own race and time. This class are very enthusiastic on first reaching the new "Zion," but often grow discontented, and fall again into their doubting and querulous habits. But as they did not think their way into Mormonism, they cannot think themselves out, and so they simply float. Sometimes they apostatize, but are no loss to the Church and no gain to the Gentiles, from pure lack of intellectual vigor.
IV. The fourth class consists of, those who really believe in Mormonism with all its absurdities and contradictions. They never doubt for a moment, that Joseph Smith was sent direct from God, and that Brigham Young is his successor. This class comprises about half of the whole community, and they are the really dangerous element. No miraculous story is too great for their belief, if it have the stamp of " authority," and no oppression or priestly tyranny seems to shake their faith for a moment; and, paradoxical as it may seem, in this class are found all the virtues of the Mormon community. They are industrious, frugal (often from necessity), and reasonably temperate. Their honesty, I think, has been overrated, and Brigham and other leaders often say the same. Yet, one may travel among them for weeks. as I have done, and meet with nothing but kindness and hospitality.
But in their very virtues lies the greatest danger. Their constancy to their leaders is wonderful, and their gullibility and capacity to swallow the marvelous, beyond belief; so they constitute a mass of dangerous power in the hands of corrupt and treasonable men. These are the men we ought to reach and try to save, and yet they are the very ones who are hardest to influence. They will not read our books or papers, (very many of them cannot), nor listen for a moment to our arguments. They denounce everything which is not approved by the bishop, and pronounce the plainest facts of history false, if they clash with the statements of "authority." Conversing once with one such, a merchant of the city, I read the following passage from the " Book of Mormon:" "We found upon the land of promise (Central America), that there were beasts in the forest of every kind, both the cow and the ox, and the ass and the horse, and all manner of wild animals, which were for the use of men."
"Now," said I, "your Prophet says the Nephites landed in America six hundred years before Christ, and the last of them perished about A. D. 500, and all this time they had used the horse and the ass. Now, any history of America will show that the horse was completely unknown to the Indians till brought here by the Spaniards."
"0, pshaw!" was the reply, "I don't believe a word of it; it's a d-d lie, got up by some enemy of the truth."
"But," I urged, "go further back than Mormonism. Take the letters of George Washington, and you will find that he was the first man who ever imported the ass to America! Could the Nephites have had these animals, and no trace of them be found?"
"I don't believe George Washington, or any other man, knows anything about it," said he; "you examine and you will find many of the so-called facts of history are not facts. You may read every history written, and pick out every fact against that book, (Mormon) and when you look into it you will find them all false."
This was the mode of reasoning adopted by a man of extra intelligence for a Mormon. I have. talked with dozens of this sort, and no matter how clear on everything else, they seem to go wild in their logic when Mormonism was touched upon. "Do you actually believe," I asked an old lady, "that the earthly paradise will be in Jackson County, Missouri?" "Oh, yes," she said, "for the Lord pointed out the exact place to Joseph, and said that Zion should never be moved, and all the people of America who do not repent will be destroyed now in a few years, so there will be but one man for seven women. Those are the very words, and everything Joseph and Isaiah (!) said has turned out just exactly as they said it would."
Such are the ideas impressed upon the minds of these people. Numbers of them testify in the most positive manner to miraculous cures performed upon themselves or their friends, simply by the "laying on of hands" by an elder or bishop. They devoutly believe that Stephen A. Douglas failed politically, because he urged vigorous measures against the Mormons, and that Frank P. Blair is sinking for the same reason. The late war never would have occurred, they think, if Johnston's army had not been sent; and as to thrashing the United States, they consider it will be a mere "breakfast spells" when things get in the right fix, and Brigham gives the word. At his command they would fight the world in arms, or quietly give up their all and migrate to any part of the world he might designate. The most of this class will stick to Mormonism as long as it has an existence, but the other classes will fall away whenever it is to their interest to do so.
But with mere moral distinctions the Government and people of the United States have little to do. The patriot and statesman will ask a more important question: What is the state of public feeling among the Mormons; how do they stand affected towards the General Government? In a full answer many influences are to be considered. It must be remembered in starting, that at least seven-eighths of all these people are foreigners, and that of the lowest and most ignorant class; that they came direct from Europe to Utah, and know absolutely nothing of the States and their people; that they merely have Mormonism grafted on to Europeanism, and cannot be expected to become nationalized like their countrymen who settle in the East. Whatever distinctively American feeling they have must, then, be looked for in the influences there and the teachings of the Church. Those influences and teachings are all anti-American. Mormonism teaches three doctrines directly opposed to the spirit of the Constitution and our institutions.
1. The union of Church and State; or rather the complete absorption of the state in the church; that the former is a mere appendage of the latter for convenience sake, and may be dropped whenever convenience no longer calls for a state organization.
2. The shedding of a man's blood, for the remission of his sins, even his sins against the Church. This is sometimes denied and sometimes advocated, but that it is a doctrine of the Mormon Church is now beyond doubt. Brigham openly says that the only reason why it is not more generally advocated is, that it is "too strong a doctrine for the weak in faith; the people are not fully prepared for it," etc. Unwilling to leave this matter doubtful in any mind, I clip the following extracts from published sermons, the first from those of Jedediah M. Grant, delivered in the Tabernacle:
"Brethren and sisters, we want you to repent and forsake your sins. And you that have committed sins that cannot be forgiven through baptism, let your blood be shed, and let the smoke ascend, that the incense thereof may come up before God, as atonement for your sins, and that the sinners in Zion may be afraid." (Deseret News, October 1, 1856.)
"We have been trying long enough with these people, and I go in for letting the sword of the Almighty be unsheathed, not only in word, but in deed." (Ibid.)
"I say that there are men and women here, that I would advise to go to the President immediately, and ask him to appoint a committee to attend to their case, and then let a place be selected, and let that committee shed their blood." (Deseret News, September, 1856.)
Which was endorsed by Brigham, as follows:
"There are sins men commit for which they cannot receive forgiveness in this world, or in that which is to come, and if they had their eyes open to see their condition, they would be perfectly willing to have their blood spilt upon the ground, that the smoke thereof might ascend to heaven as an offering for their sins; whereas, if such is not the case, they will stick to them and remain upon them in the spirit world. I know when you hear my brethren talk about cutting people off from the earth, you consider it strong doctrine. It is to save them, not to destroy them. It is true that the blood of the Son of God was shed for our sins, but men can commit sins which it can never remit.
"As it was in ancient days, so is it in our day; the law is precisely the same. There are sins that the blood of a lamb or a calf cannot remit, but they must be atoned for by the blood of man. That is the reason why men talk to you as they do from this stand. They understand the doctrine and throw out a few words about it." (Deseret News, October 1, 1856.)
This is "sound Mormon doctrine," and that many have been sacrificed under it, is well known in Utah. This is one of the features of Mormonism I was slow to believe, nor did I credit it without overwhelming proof; but to put the matter beyond doubt, more than one prominent Mormon has avowed the doctrine to me, and defended it as an ordinance of God.
Under this law Potter, and the Parish family of Springville, were murdered when attempting to leave the Territory, and Potter and Wilson of Weber Valley, were assassinated in jail; under the same law the Mormons claim the right to slay all who commit adultery, "or violate a sanctified oath," and for this cause Elder John Hyde was compelled to flee from the Territory, while his friends Margetts and Cowdy, were followed several hundred miles and barbarously murdered.
3. The third anti-American feature of Mormonism is the complete subserviency and mental slavery of woman, not as to polygamy alone, though that is an outgrowth, but in everything.
Their theology teaches that "as Eve led Adam out of Paradise, he must lead her back," and though they hesitatingly admit that she may secure "a salvation" without man's help, she cannot secure "an exaltation." She must have a husband "to lead her into the presence of God, and introduce her to that husband's glory." "She will not necessarily go to hell, because she is single, but she never can rise to the first glory." Such an atrocious and un-Christian idea can have but one tendency, to make woman merely a creature for man's convenience and pleasure. Hence, all our American ideas of dower, partition, equal descent, and woman holding land in fee apart from her husband, are unknown to the laws of Utah. Everything a woman possesses at marriage becomes absolutely the property of her husband. The feminine interest is nowhere provided for, and, in looking over their laws, if they have any Common Law at all, it seems to be a transcript of that which prevailed in the time of James I. The further we pursue the investigation the more this tendency appears, till it is plain to be seen there is none of what we call Americanism there. The spirit exists neither in their birth, training nor religion. To them Brigham is the Government and Utah is America. They know no other, and consider it the height of presumption for the United States authorities to claim the right to rule over them. True they claim to be true Americans, just as the Abyssinians claim to be true Christians, while it is evident neither understand their own words.
But there is another curious fact bearing on their views. On the 25th of December, 1832, Joseph Smith delivered a remarkable prophecy, detailing what was to happen to America for her "persecution of the Saints." It was published in The Seer, a Mormon periodical in Washington City, of April, 1854, from which I copy:
"WAR!
"Verily thus saith the Lord concerning the wars that will shortly come to pass, beginning at the rebellion of South Carolina, which will eventually terminate in the death and misery of many souls. The days will come that wars will be poured out upon all nations, beginning at that place; for, behold, the Southern States shall be divided against the Northern States; and the Southern States will call upon other nations, even the nation of Great Britain, as it is called, and they shall also call upon other nations, in order to defend themselves against other nations; and thus war shall be poured out upon all nations. And it shall come to pass, after many days, slaves shall rise up against their masters, who shall be marshaled and disciplined for war. And it will come to pass, also, that the remnant which are left of the land* shall marshal themselves and shall become exceedingly angry, and shall vex the Gentiles with a sore vexation. And thus, with the sword and by bloodshed, the inhabitants of the earth shall mourn, and with famine and plague and earthquakes, and the thunder of heaven, and the fierce and vivid lightning, also, shall the inhabitants of the earth be made to feel the wrath and indignation and chastening hand of an Almighty God, until the consumption decreed hath made an end of all nations; that the cry of the Saints and of the blood of the Saints shall cease to come up into the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth, from the earth, to be avenged of their enemies. Wherefore stand ye in holy places, and be not moved until the day of the Lord come; for, behold, it cometh quickly, saith the Lord! Amen."
* The Indians.
It will be perceived that of the thousand predictions in relation to our civil war, Joseph's was among the most shrewd, and certainly hit on two or three very curious things. But he met with the difficulty common to all prophets in these days, when he ran into particulars he missed it seriously. With the benevolent design of saving the country, Joseph offered himself for President" but as he was rejected, of course the evil is bound to come. With the Mormons this is the grand prophecy. War is to go on, they say, till nearly all the men in the Union are killed, and then the Saints are to return and set up "Zion" in Jackson County, Missouri; and the faithful who have meanwhile gathered, are to possess the whole land, and be husbands to all the widows and fathers to all the orphans. Then is to come the time mentioned by Isaiah, when "seven women shall take hold of one man," and agree to earn their own support, if they only may "be called by his name to take away their reproach," which reproach, of course, is childlessness; or, commercially speaking, women will be at a heavy discount, and men at 600 per cent. premium.
As near as I can determine there have been about ten thousand commentaries written and preached on this prophecy; for the varying circumstances of every year, and almost every week, require new elucidations of the way it is all to come about. The war, of course, settled it all for awhile; but that stopped so suddenly, they maintain it must soon break out again, and several of their commentators concluded the last Presidential election would signal its re-opening. What folly for any people to pretend fealty to an institution which they claim is going to eternal smash in ten years at the most.
It is a law of mind that what we prophecy often we soon come to wish for; and if there were no other cause, the tendency of all their preaching and prophesying is to make them look eagerly for the downfall of our Government. It is a prime principle in their creed that all mankind but themselves are on the swift road to ruin, and they are never so well pleased as in listening to statements in regard to "the great increase of crime and immorality in the States." I could not make one of them angry quicker than by persistently arguing that the highest degree of prosperity prevails in the East today, and my best friends were ready to knock me down at the statement that there were still more men than women in the United States.
I showed them from the census that the men were in a majority of 730,000 in 1860; that by immigration we gained several hundred thousand more men than women, and did not lose, at the outside, more than 700,000 in the war. They maintained that by authentic (?) Southern histories, we lost in battle one million rebels and two million Yankees! How easy to make men believe what they wish. All the "persecutions" these people talk so much of, were caused by Southerners and Democrats and yet they are all rebel sympathizers and pro-slavery politicians. They talk loud and long of their loyalty, when there is anything to be gained by it; but send there a Federal judge or officer, who refuses to be Brigham's tool, and you soon hear their real feelings toward the Union. Just now they are only waiting, watching a few weeks or months till all shall go to destruction in the States, when they will return and occupy their terrestrial heaven-Jackson County, Missouri. Thus this vast mass of ignorance has been wrought upon and moulded by a few leaders, till the people are ready for any desperate enterprise those men may direct. The common people, two-thirds of them at least, are naturally peaceable, too; but they are so terribly priest-ridden, that their best qualities are as dangerous as other men's worst.
Like the poor of all lands, they are constant in their attachments; but with the favorites they have chosen, their constancy is a vice rather than a virtue. No doubt a very large number would apostatize rather than suffer; but half of them are so rooted and grounded in their faith, they will blindly follow their leaders, whatever course they take.
There are no free schools in Utah, and no organized systems of instruction; nevertheless the social and intellectual condition of the people is far superior to what it was ten or even five years ago. There is a general prejudice against the learned professions, particularly medicine; and a general feeling that the Saints are above the necessity of such knowledge - which idea is summed up by Brigham Young in these words: " Study twenty years in the world's knowledge, and God Almighty will give the poorest Saint more knowledge in five minutes than you get in all that time." In this social view, it were an endless task to mention all the thousand forms of popular error, the belief in witchcraft, dreams, evestra, ghostly fancies. and "faith-doctoring" which prevail among them; but it is worthy of remark that there is certainly no other place in America where retrograde ideas, as they might be called, prevail so extensively as in Utah. Nine-tenths of the Saints seem to have taken up one common wail about everything outside of Utah. Whether it is to persuade themselves that they are really better than other men, or to console themselves at the thought of others' misery, it seems to be their meat and drink to denigrate the character of the rest of mankind. They take up the wailing jeremiad that there is so much more crime in the country than formerly; that people generally are so much more dishonest; that there are so few virtuous women; that the country is rapidly going to decay; that religion has lost its power; that all political action is wrong, slavery ought never to have been abolished, and nothing should have been done as it has been for the last twenty-five years. To quote history or statistics to the contrary would be no proof at all to them; they regard all such as "Gentile lies." And thus, in the supreme belief that they alone are "in the ark of safety," they confidently wait for the "great tribulation" which is now about due; while thousands of them fully expect to live to see the time when the American nation shall be a thing of the past, and Macaulay's New Zealander shall "sit on London Bridge and muse on the decline and fall of the British Empire."
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