In his "To the Person Sitting In Darkness" Twain is showing the immoral path America has set itself on by trying to establish an empire similar to those of European governments of the time. He despises the path of brutality and inhumanity that the Americans have set for themselves as their nations policy in dealing with inferior races both in their own country (the aboriginal population) but also China and the Philippines also disparages the role of churches and their missionaries in the spread of the American dream in foreign countries on the pretext of spreading the Christian religion. The satire he uses is similar to, but much more overt, than Kipling's "The White Man's Burden"