California is a gilded state.

It has not the sordidness of gold, as has Wall Street, but it is the embodiment of the natural ore that the ragged prospector finds.

The gold of California is the color of the orange, the glitter of dawn in the Yosemite, the hue of the golden gate that opens the sunset way to mystic and terrible Cathay and Hindustan.
The enemy of California says the state is magnificent but thin.

He declares it is as though it were painted on a Brobdingnagian piece of gilt paper, and he who dampens his finger and thrusts it through finds an alkali valley on the other side, the lonely prickly pear, and a heap of ashes from a deserted camp-fire.

He says the citizens of this state lack the richness of an aesthetic and religious tradition.