Prime Rule

The Prime Rule is Mike’s principle of waiting rather than forcing a premature judgment. In the closing exchange with Jubal, it becomes the standard by which Mike’s own impatience is measured: he has urged others to wait, but now, discouraged after a short trial, is ready to give up on his experiment in human community.

The Rule Applied to Its Founder

Jubal recalls that Mike has repeatedly told others not to hurry, using the assurance that “waiting will fill.” Mike confirms the attribution. Jubal then points out the contradiction: Mike has waited only a little while, a span he describes as very short by Martian standards, yet already wants to abandon the work. The Prime Rule thus applies not just to the community Mike teaches, but to his own response when its results disappoint him.

Evidence and Scale

Jubal does not dismiss the experiment as a failure. He says it has already worked for a small group, whose members he has seen as happy, healthy, cheerful, and free of jealousy. That outcome, he argues, should be enough for the short time Mike has invested. His proposed test is deliberately larger and later: Mike should return to the question when a thousand times as many people are working and happy without jealousy. The measure of success is therefore not an immediate universal conversion, but a community allowed time to grow.

Failure, Choice, and the Rule’s Meaning

Jubal also challenges Mike’s suspicion that most people have rejected the teaching because humanity needs its existing evils as a means of selection. He reframes the apparent failure: Mike has not been doing the weeding out; those who failed to listen have, in effect, excluded themselves. In this exchange the Prime Rule becomes a discipline against mistaking early resistance for a final verdict. Mike accepts Jubal’s correction, addressing him as Father and acknowledging that he speaks rightly.