I step up, and in timid tones begin, "Reverend sir, will you tell me
by what right you take this wealth?"

Instantly a frown comes upon his face, and he cries in a voice of
thunder, "Blasphemer!" And all the Bootstrap-lifters desist from their
lifting, and menace me with furious looks. There is a general call for
a policeman of the Wholesale Pickpockets' Association; and so I fall
silent, and slink away in the throng, and thereafter keep my thoughts
to myself.

Over the vast plain I wander, observing a thousand strange and
incredible and terrifying manifestations of the Bootstrap-lifting
impulse. There is, I discover, a regular propaganda on foot; a long
time ago--no man can recall how far back--the Wholesale Pickpockets
made the discovery of the ease with which a man's pockets could be
rifled while he was preoccupied with spiritual exercises, and they
began offering prizes for the best essays in support of the practice.
Now their propaganda is everywhere triumphant, and year by year we see
an increase in the rewards and emoluments of the prophets and priests
of the cult. The ground is covered with stately temples of various
designs, all of which I am told are consecrated to Bootstrap-lifting.
I come to where a group of people are occupied in laying the
corner-stone of a new white marble structure; I inquire and am
informed it is the First Church of Bootstrap-lifters, Scientist. As I
stand watching, a card is handed to me, informing me that a lady will
do my Bootstrap-lifting at five dollars per lift.

I go on to another building, which I am told is a library containing
volumes in defense of the Bootstrap-lifters, published under the