How completely different it is with regard to the products in a department store or commercial firm, is it not? Here many wonderful things are also exhibited, yes, even things of genius. But these have not yet been released for public ownership or display to simply be for the general public to see for free. They are still tied and bound or monopolised as funds by which smart business magnates and shareholders can increase their wealth by the day without even performing any significant work and, thus, to a large extent live at the expense of the producers or creators. What about all the other products in such a department store, do they not serve the same purpose? And who are they that make all these products? Are they beings that make them solely for the joy in making these products without regard to economics or profit? No, this will be absolutely the exception. The general rule, however, is that they are made by paid workers who   forced from birth by the circumstances of their necessitous state   were predestined to sell their labour so and so many hours a day of their lives in order to salvage exactly those hours of the same life they will necessarily need to use for sleep, and to see to the survival of the species or their erotic needs. That the work manifested by these beings is not performed on the basis of the joy of just doing it for the sake of the work itself, no matter what it may cost, whether or not it is paid, is a matter of course. Indeed, the general rule is that it is only done as paid work. But paid work is exactly the same as paid life, and paid life is again the same as slavery. The department stores and other commercial firms and local shops thereby differ from the museums in that while these latter are showrooms for products of genius, produced selflessly and donated by their creators, more through the joy in creation itself and the joy and inspiration they can be for others than in the expectation of material gain, the department stores and the other commercial firms are, on the other hand, showrooms for products that are produced by "slaves" or beings that under compulsion have had to sell so and so many hours a day of their lives in order to salvage the remaining hours of the day. This production or these products has again for the owners of the commercial firms or department stores the sole aim of being a means of payment or currency camouflaged as consumer goods, through which they can acquire or purchase the use of even more hours, days or months of the lives of other beings. What does one think about buying a product in such a department store whose retail price may amount to at least twice the manufacturing price, everything included? Does one not pay here a sum of money that one does not get anything for? And does it not mean so or so many days or months of work with one or other employer of the impecunious buyer?
      In truth, there is a difference between a commercial department store and a museum. The commercial firm exists by virtue of the purchase and sale of the lives of terrestrial human beings, which to a corresponding extent in principle means "slavery". The museum, on the other hand, exists by virtue of the great master's selflessly created, ingenious works of art, in whose breathtaking force of inspiration and vibrant intellectual radiance it seeks to envelop and caress all its visitors. Here, by these two kinds of stores or shops, do we not stand at the gates of two worlds? Is not the entrance to the commercial firm or department store the gateway to the essence of the world where life is pledged as payment for the hours one must of necessity have for sleeping and promoting the propagation and continuation of the species or lineage, and where one therefore "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread"? Therefore, the question here is not what work one would prefer to perform but, on the contrary, which work gives the most money or the highest economic gain, as the currency appropriated here constitutes the straw that all economically enslaved terrestrial human beings seize on with greediness in the belief that those with this straw can raise themselves up out of material captivity and buy back the lost freedom of their souls. And the department store or business world is based on this superstition. And the more spectacular stainless steel columns, mirror glass doors and marble façades they shine with, the more powerfully they confirm and express the triumph of this superstition. But just as someone drowning cannot save themselves with a straw, so can no being whatsoever really buy true spiritual freedom for itself with currency, kroner, dollars or sterling. Wealth is as great a material prison of the soul as poverty. Did not the world redeemer tell his disciples that "it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of God"? No, the grand palaces, stores and banking houses of the business world do not represent the way forward to the Christmas Gospel's great and lasting "peace on earth" and the "good will for human beings" that results from this.