nd a light revolver-carbine - the thunderbolts of that pitiful Jupiter.' And yet such displays are common in civil societies: carrying arms in the name of gods: flags, leaders; against individuals who might otherwise be brothers, but who happen to live on the wrong side of a collectively imagined border or believe in a different deity at the head of their collectively understood religion. In these ways, the natives become a reflection of how absurdly we give up our bodies and our thoughts to the Durkheimian group, and shed light on the reality that is human nature. This realization terrifies Marlow, as indicated by his pronouncement: "I don't want to know anything of the ceremonies used when approaching Mr. Kurtz,...Curious, this feeling came over me that such details would be more intolerable than those heads drying on the stakes under Mr. Kurtz's windows." Marlow is forced to conclude, however, that any partition between the reality of civilization and the seeming unreality of primitive savagery is diaphanous at best. As Marlow comes to understand Kurtz's 'society' as a reflection on all civilizations, and Kurtz's actions as a reflection of the evil that resides in the hearts of all men, he must necessarily conclude that all civilizations are, in some small way, shrouded in darkness. His ultimate conclusion about societies is that they are a form of escapism from the darkness of human nature,: 'When you have to attend to [menial tasks], to the mere incidents of the surface, the reality - the reality, I tell you - fades. The inner truth is hidden - luckily, luckily. But I feel it all the same []" That the surface realities of social man's life are little but absurd trappings of civilization is evidenced by the socialization of the savages to the colonialist 'white' government. Marlow describes and parodies three savages who have, in Rousseau's tradition, accepted the yoke of the colonialist on the condition that they have power enough ...
