The worship of self

"The world has seen and tired of the worship of Nature, of Reason, of Humanity; for this nineteenth century has been reserved the development of the most refined religion of all - the worship of self . . . The enslavement of his weaker brethren - "the labor of those who do not enjoy, for the enjoyment of those who do not labor" - the degradation of women - the torture of the animal world - these are the steps of the ladder by which man is ascending to his higher civilization . . . This, then, is the glorious future to which the advocate of secular education may look forward: the dawn that gilds the horizon of his hopes! And age when all forms of religious thought shall be a thing of the past: when chemistry and biology shall be the ABC of a State of education enforced on all; when vivisection shall be practiced in every college and school; and when the man of science, looking forth over a world which will then own no other sway than his, shall exult in the thought that he has made of this fair green earth, if not a heaven for man, at least a hell for animals."

-C.E. Dodgson (Lewis Carroll), 1832-1898