Robert Heinlein - A Stranger in a Strange Land

Jubal was just leaving the table as the Man from Mars came in. "Father! Oh, Jubal!" Mike hugged and kissed him.

Jubal gently unwound himself from the embrace. "Be your age, son. Sit down and enjoy your breakfast. I'll sit with you."

"I didn't come here looking for breakfast, I came looking for you. We'll find a place and talk."

"All right."

They went to the living room of one of the suites, Mike pulling Jubal by the hand like an excited small boy welcoming his favorite grandparent. Mike picked a big comfortable chair for Jubal and sprawled himself on a couch opposite and close to him. This room was on the side of the wing having the private landing flat; there were high French windows opening to it. Jubal got up and shifted his chair slightly so that he would not be facing so directly into the light in looking at his foster son; not to his surprise but mildly to his annoyance the heavy chair shifted as if it had been no more massive than a child's balloon, his hand merely guided it.

Two men and a woman were in the room when they arrived. These left shortly, leisurely, severally, and unostentatiously. After that they were alone, except that they were both served with Jubal's favorite brandy - by hand, to Jubal's pleasure; he was quite ready to agree that the remote control these people had over objects around them was a labor-saver and probably a money-saver (certainly on laundry! - his spaghetti-splashed shirt had been so fresh that he had put it on again today), and obviously a method much to be preferred for household convenience to the blind balkiness of mechanical gadgets. Nevertheless he was not used to telecontrol done without wires or waves; it startled Jubal the way horseless carriages had disturbed decent, respectable horses about the time Jubal was born.

Duke served the brandy. Mike said, "Hi, Cannibal. Thanks. Are you the new butler?"

"De nada, Monster. Somebody has to do it and you've got every brain in the place slaving away over a hot microphone."

"Well, they'll all be through in a couple of hours and you can revert to your useless, lecherous existence. The job is done, Cannibal. Pau. Thirty. Ended."

"The whole damn Martian language all in one lump? Monster, I had better check you for burned-out capacitors."

"Oh, no, no! Only the primer knowledge that I have of it - had of it, my brain's an empty sack. But highbrows like Stinky will be going back to Mars for a century to fill in what I never learned. But I did turn out quite a job - about six weeks of subjective time since around five this morning or whenever it was we adjourned the meeting - and now the stalwart steady types can finish it and I'm free to visit with Jubal with nothing on my mind." Mike stretched and yawned. "Feels good. Finishing a job always feels good."

"You'll be slaving away at something else before the day is out. Boss, this Martian monster can't take it or leave it alone. I know for a fact that this is the first time he has simply relaxed and done nothing for over two months. He ought to sign up with 'Workers Anonymous.' Or you ought to visit us more often. You're a good influence on him."

"God forbid that I should ever be a good influence on anybody."

"And you get out of here, Cannibal, and quit telling lies about me."

"Lies, hell. You turned me into a compulsive truth-teller� and it's a great handicap in some of the joints where I hang out." Duke left them.

Mike lifted his glass. "Share water, my brother Father Jubal"

"Drink deep, son."

"Thou art God."

"Take it easy, Mike. I'll put up with that from the others and answer it politely. But don't you come godding at me. I knew you when you were 'only an egg'."

"Okay, Jubal."

"That's better. When did you start drinking in the morning? Do that at your age and you'll ruin your stomach. You'll never live to be a happy old soak, like me."

Mike looked at his partly emptied glass. "I drink when it's a sharing to do so. It doesn't have any effect on me, nor on most of the others, unless we want it to. Once I let it have its effect without stopping it, until I passed out. It's an odd sensation. Not a goodness, I grok. Just a way to discorporate for a while without discorporating. I can get a similar effect, only much better and with no damage to be repaired afterwards, by withdrawing."

"Economical, at least."

"Uh huh, our liquor bill isn't anything. Matter of fact, running that whole Temple hasn't cost what it costs you to keep up our home. Except for the initial investment and replacing some of the props, coffee and cakes was about all - we made our own fun. We were happy. We needed so little that I used to wonder what to do with all the money that came in."

"Then why did you take collections?"

"Huh? Oh, you have to charge 'em, Jubal. The marks won't pay serious attention to anything that's free."

"I knew that, I just wondered if you did."

"Oh, yes, I grok marks, Jubal. At first I did try to preach free - just give it away. I had plenty of money, I thought it was all right. It didn't work. We humans have to make considerable progress before we can accept a free gift, and value it. Usually I never let them have anything free until about Sixth Circle. By then they can accept� and accepting is much harder than giving."

"Hmm� son, I think maybe you should write a book on human psychology."

"I have. But it's in Martian. Stinky has the tapes." Mike looked again at his glass, took a slow sybaritic sip. "We do use some liquor. A few of us - Saul, myself, Sven, some others - like it. And I've learned that I can let it have just a little effect, then hold it right at that point, and gain a euphoric growing-closer much like trance without having to withdraw. The minor damage is easy to repair." He sipped again. "That's what I'm doing this morning - letting myself get just the mildest glow and be happy with you."

Jubal studied him closely. "Son, you aren't drinking entirely to be sociable; you've got something on your mind."

"Yes, I have."

"Do you want to talk it out?"

"Yes. Father, it's always a great goodness to be with you, even if nothing is troubling me. But you are the only human I can always talk to and know that you will grok and that you yourself won't be overwhelmed by it, too. Jill� Jill always groks - but if it hurts me, it hurts her still more. Dawn the same. Patty� well, Patty can always take my hurt away, but she does it by keeping it herself. All three of them are too easily hurt for me to risk sharing in full with them anything I can't grok and cherish before I share it." Mike looked very thoughtful. "Confession is needful. The Catholics know that, they have it - and they have a corps of strong men to take it. The Fosterites have group confession and pass it around among themselves and thin it out. I need to introduce confession into this church, as part of the early purging - oh, we have it now, but spontaneously, after the pilgrim no longer really needs it. We need strong men for that - 'sin' is hardly ever concerned with a real wrongness but sin is what the sinner groks as sin - and when you grok it with him, it can be very disturbing. I know."

Mike went on earnestly, "Goodness is not enough, goodness is never enough. That was one of my first mistakes, because among Martians goodness and wisdom are the same thing, identical. But not with us. Take Jill. Her goodness was perfect when I met her. Nevertheless she was all mixed up inside - and I almost destroyed her, and myself too - for I was just as mixed up - before we got squared away. Her endless patience (not very common on this planet) was all that saved us� while I was learning to be a human and she was learning what I knew.

"But goodness alone is never enough. A hard, cold wisdom is required, too, for goodness to accomplish good. Goodness without wisdom invariably accomplishes evil." He smiled and his face lit up. "And that's why I need you, Father, as well as loving you. I need to make confession to you.,'