1245. But how, indeed, could they be otherwise than they are? They cannot very well do away with their "prisons" and "penitentiaries", and allow the "criminals" to have free rein. If they did, the nations would of course become far more "heathen". This is, indeed, absolutely true. But it is not in order to persecute the states or to criticise them in any evil way that we have presented the above-mentioned facts here. On the contrary, throughout Livets Bog every reader will see that it is a defence and an explanation of the fact that nothing can be more perfect than it is at this precise moment, on account of its past and with a view to what it will manifest in the future. The "problem of punishment" is presented here precisely because in the future it will not continue being as it is today. Showing that society is in disharmony with itself is therefore also a link in the absolute perfection of the moment. Society believes that it is "perfectly Christian" and that its judicial system represents the correspondingly "perfect Christian" humaneness or love, but the truth is that its judicial system, and the practical life based on it, is to a great extent the very opposite of Christianity, and represents "war", "punishment" and "revenge".