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you see before you, alive and unbelievably active, is the end product of millions of experiments over hundreds of years—secret experiments. The outside world knows nothing of what we have attempted to do. Womankind as a whole has adapted herself to life as we know it, and in the course of time a very stable and efficient form of society has been developed. We live, and live very well indeed, without a male sex; so much so that it is questionable whether society would be any the better off if a reversion to bisexual conditions were to occur."

A murmur of agreement rippled round her audience. The Mistress was merely echoing opinions that had been inbred since birth in all of them.

"Nevertheless, it has always been the policy of the government to control every factor that might influence the structure of our society, and it has always been realized that a species without a male sex might, in some way, be lacking in some fundamental psychological component that . . . well, to put it simply, would maintain overall human sanity."

"Nonsense," said one of the cytologists, smiling. "As a race we are saner than ever before in history."

"Why," said another, echoing the smug good humor of her colleague, "we all know that the age of insanity was the age of men. Every child is taught that in the State school."

The Mistress smiled grimly. "Governmental policy is rather different from what is taught in State schools. Racial sanity is more than a question of racial behavior. It involves deep psychology on a mass basis, a racial neurosis, if you like. There are very good reasons for believing that the stable form of society in which we live is essentially neurotic." She scanned her audience like a radar antenna. "A neurosis can be extremely stable, particularly when it is based on a long established perversion. That is the condition of our society today."

Murmurs of doubtful assent and disguised bewilderment.