LUBIN. And how soon do you expect this modest end to be reached?
FRANKLYN. Never, thank God! As there is no limit to power and knowledge there can be no end. 'The power and the glory, world without end': have those words meant nothing to you?
BURGE [pulling out an old envelope] I should like to make a note of that. [He does so].
CONRAD. There will always be something to live for.
SURGE [pocketing his envelope and becoming more and more businesslike] Right: I have got that. Now what about sin? What about the Fall? How do you work them in?
CONRAD. I don't work in the Fall. The Fall is outside Science. But I daresay Frank can work it in for you.
SURGE [to Franklyn] I wish you would, you know. It's important. Very important.
FRANKLYN. Well, consider it this way. It is clear that when Adam and Eve were immortal it was necessary that they should make the earth an extremely comfortable place to live in.
BURGE. True. If you take a house on a ninety-nine years lease, you spend a good deal of money on it. If you take it for three months you generally have a bill for dilapidations to pay at the end of them.
FRANKLYN. Just so. Consequently, when Adam had the Garden of Eden on a lease for ever, he took care to make it what the house agents call a highly desirable country residence. But the moment he invented death, and became a tenant for life only, the place was no longer worth the trouble. It was then that he let the thistles grow. Life was so short that it was no longer worth his while to do anything thoroughly well.