They force the light-bearers to hide themselves and their torches.

These dreamers, these visionaries, these star-gazers,--they are hooted and derided.

Laughter is let loose around them, machine-made laughter, quarrelsome and beastly:-- "Your notion of peace is only utopian, anyway, as long as you never, any day, stopped the war by yourself!" They point to the battlefield and its wreckage:-- "And you say that War won't be forever?
Look, driveler!" The circle of the setting sun is crimsoning the mingled horizon of humanity:-- "You say that the sun is bigger than the earth?
Look, imbecile!" They are anathema, they are sacrilegious, they are excommunicated, who impeach the magic of the past and the poison of tradition.

And the thousand million victims themselves scoff at and strike those who rebel, as soon as they are able.

All cast stones at them, all, even those who suffer and while they are suffering--even the sacrificed, a little before they die.
The bleeding soldiers of Wagram cry: "Long live the emperor!" And the mournful exploited in the streets cheer for the defeat of those who are trying to alleviate a suffering which is brother to theirs.