"Robert A. Heinlein - Methuselahs Children" - читать интересную книгу автора (Heinlein Robert A)

EARTH-EATING FAD MOVES WEST: CHICAGO PARSON EATS CLAY
SANDWICH IN PULPIT
„Back to simple things,“ he advises flock.
LOS ANGELES HI-SCHOOL MOB DEFIES SCHOOL BOARD
„Higher Pay, Shorter hours, no Homework-We Demand
Our Right to Elect Teachers, Coaches.“


SUICIDE RATE UP NINTH SUCCESSIVE YEAR

AEC Denies Fall-Out to Blame


„’-The Crazy Years.’ The trustees of that date decided-correctly, we now
believe-that any minority during that period of semantic disorientation and
mass hysteria was a probable target for persecution, discriminatory
legislation, and even of mob violence. Furthermore the disturbed financial
condition of the country and in particular the forced exchange of trust
securities for government warrants threatened the solvency of the trust.
„Two courses of action were adopted: the assets of the Foundation were
converted into real wealth and distributed widely among members of the
Families to be held by them as owners-of-record; and the so-called
‚Masquerade’ was adopted as a permanent policy. Means were found to
simulate the death of any member of the Families who lived to a socially
embarrassing age and to provide him with a new identity in another part of
the country.
„The wisdom of this later policy, though irksome to some, became evident at
once during the Interregnum of the Prophets. The Families at the beginning
of the reign of the First Prophet had ninety-seven per cent of their members
with publicly avowed ages of less than fifty years. The close public
registration enforced by the secret police of the Prophets made changes of
public identity difficult, although a few were accomplished with the aid of the
revolutionary Cabal.
„Thus, a combination of luck and foresight saved our Secret from public
disclosure. This was well-we may be sure that things would have gone
harshly at that time for any group possessing a prize beyond the power of the
Prophet to confiscate.
„The Families took no part as such in the events leading up to the Second
American Revolution, but many members participated and served with credit
in the Cabal and in the fighting which preceded the fall of New Jerusalem.
We took advantage of the period of disorganization which followed to
readjust the ages of our kin who had grown conspicuously old. In this we
were aided by certain members of the Families who, as members of the
Cabal, held key posts in the Reconstruction.
„It was argued by many at the Families’ meeting of 2075, the year of the
Covenant, that we should reveal ourselves, since civil liberty was firmly
reestablished. The majority did not agree at that time . . . perhaps through
long habits of secrecy and caution. But the renascence of culture in the
ensuing fifty years, the steady growth of tolerance and good manners, the
semantically sound orientation of education, the increased respect for the