And Orwell's insight into power is exactly what happens. Many people have asked me if the leadership have a dozen BMWs and Rolls Royces the way some cult leaders do. No, I said. A couple of them might have money stashed in a Luxembourg account but the money is not present. Then why do they do it, I am asked.
Evidence abounds, especially on alt.religion.scientology.
What pure power means you will understand presently. We are different from all the oligarchies of the past in that we know what we are doing. All the others, even those who resembled ourselves, were cowards and hypocrites. The German Nazis and the Russian Communists came very close to us in their own motives. They pretended, perhaps they even believed, that they had seized power unwillingly and for a limited time, and that just round the corner there lay a paradise where human beings would be free and equal.