"I thought not. You haven't lived long enough yet. Well, I'll finish, anyhow."
"I'll remember," said Susan. "I'll think about it until I do understand."
"I hope so. The weather and the scenery make me feel like philosophizing. Finally, if you come through the second stage all right, you'll enter the third stage. There, you'll see that you were right at first when you thought only the strong could afford to do right. And you'll see that you were right in the second stage when you thought only the strong could afford to do wrong. For you'll have learned that only the strong can afford to act at all, and that they can do right or wrong as they please because they are strong."
"Then you don't believe in right, at all!" exclaimed the girl, much depressed, but whether for the right or for her friend she could not have told.
"Now, who said that?" Demanded he, amused. "What did I say? Why—if you want to do right, be strong or you'll be crushed; and if you want to do wrong, take care again to be strong—or you'll be crushed. My moral is, be strong! In this world the good weaklings and the bad weaklings had better lie low, hide in the tall grass. The strong inherit the earth."
They were silent a long time, she thinking, he observing her with sad tenderness. At last he said:
"You are a nice sweet girl—well brought up. But that means badly brought up for the life you've got to lead—the life you've got to learn to lead."
"I'm beginning to see that," said the girl. Her gravity made him feel like laughing, and brought the tears to his eyes. The laughter he suppressed.
"You're going to fight your way up to what's called the triumphant class—the people on top—they have all the success, all the money, all the good times. Well, the things you've been taught—at church—in the Sunday School—in the nice storybooks you've read—those things are all for the triumphant class, or for people working meekly along in 'the station to which God has appointed them' and handing over their earnings to their betters. But those nice moral things you believe in—they don't apply to people like you—fighting their way up from the meek working class to the triumphant class. You won't believe me now—won't understand thoroughly. But soon you'll see. Once you've climbed up among the successful people you can afford to indulge—in moderation—in practicing the good old moralities. Any dirty work you may need done you can hire done and pretend not to know about it. But while you're climbing, no Golden Rule and no turning of the cheek. Tooth and claw then—not sheathed but naked—not by proxy but in your own person."
"But you're not like that," said the girl.