“Oh, shut up!” said Amory briskly and, paying no attention to the little man’s enraged stare, he went on with his argument.
“The human stomach—” he began; but the big man interrupted rather impatiently.
“I’m letting you talk, you know,” he said, “but please avoid stomachs. I’ve been feeling mine all day. Anyway, I don’t agree with one-half you’ve said. Government ownership is the basis of your whole argument, and it’s invariably a beehive of corruption. Men won’t work for blue ribbons, that’s all rot.”
When he ceased the little man spoke up with a determined nod, as if resolved this time to have his say out.
“There are certain things which are human nature,” he asserted with an owl-like look, “which always have been and always will be, which can’t be changed.”
Amory looked from the small man to the big man helplessly.
“Listen to that! That’s what makes me discouraged with progress. Listen to that! I can name offhand over one hundred natural phenomena that have been changed by the will of man—a hundred instincts in man that have been wiped out or are now held in check by civilization. What this man here just said has been for thousands of years the last refuge of the associated mutton-heads of the world. It negates the efforts of every scientist, statesman, moralist, reformer, doctor, and philosopher that ever gave his life to humanity’s service. It’s a flat impeachment of all that’s worth while in human nature. Every person over twenty-five years old who makes that statement in cold blood ought to be deprived of the franchise.”
The little man leaned back against the seat, his face purple with rage. Amory continued, addressing his remarks to the big man.
“These quarter-educated, stale-minded men such as your friend here, who think they think, every question that comes up, you’ll find his type in the usual ghastly muddle. One minute it’s ‘the brutality and inhumanity of these Prussians’—the next it’s ‘we ought to exterminate the whole German people.’ They always believe that ‘things are in a bad way now,’ but they ‘haven’t any faith in these idealists.’ One minute they call Wilson ‘just a dreamer, not practical’—a year later they rail at him for making his dreams realities. They haven’t clear logical ideas on one single subject except a sturdy, stolid opposition to all change. They don’t think uneducated people should be highly paid, but they won’t see that if they don’t pay the uneducated people their children are going to be uneducated too, and we’re going round and round in a circle. That—is the great middle class!”
The big man with a broad grin on his face leaned over and smiled at the little man.