"Well, aside from that? At least they do work. And the younger women? You knew before that they were frivolous because they had too much money and too few responsibilities. Many of the older women have a serious and useful side, even if they do waste an unholy amount of time at cards."
"Well, if you ask me, their manners, when they remember to use 'em, are better than I expected. Only that Miss Thorndyke is cold and haughty, but perhaps that's because she's poor (for her), or is covering up something, or is just plain stupid…. Mrs. Dwight's manners are always perfect. She's my idea of a lady—just! And in the new system there'll be a long sight more ladies than is possible now, only no aristocrats…. Yes, they're decent enough considering they're rotten poisoned by money and thinkin' themselves better'n the mass; and I like their affection for one another. But they could be all that in the socialist state and more too. They'd have to cut out drink and gambling, and a few other diversions some of 'em'll drift into, if one or two of 'em haven't already—just through being bored to death."
"Do you honestly think socialism means universal virtue?"
"No, I don't. I'm no such greenhorn; though there's some that does, or pretends to…. But I mean there'd be no drifting into vice like there is now, no indulgence of any old weakness because temptation was always following them about or just round the corner. That's the trouble now…. But in the most perfect state some would be watching out for their chance, just because the old Adam was too strong in spite of the fact that all the old reminders had disappeared."
"More likely they'd all murder one another because they were some ten thousand times more bored than that poor little group whose brains you are addling."
"I don't like to hear you talk like that, Miss Gora. You ought to give that pen of yours to socialism. There would be all the revenge you could want—and it's what you're entitled to. Then I could call you Comrade Gora."
"Call me Comarade by all means if it hurts you to say Miss to a fellow worker…. You admit then that envy of a society you were not born into and which refuses to acknowledge you as an equal, is the secret of your desire to pull it down?"
"Partly that." he admitted cooly. "Not that I'd change places with any of those fat millionaires I see shuffling down the steps of the Pacific-Union Club—although I'll admit to you what I wouldn't to these young devils in my class, that I know some socialists who would. I hate the sight of 'em. But I want to do away with class-rights and class-distinctions, not only because I just naturally have no use for them but because I want to put an end to the misery of the world."
"You mean the material misery. What would you do with the other seven hundred different varieties?"
"Well…. I guess each case would have to take care of itself. Perhaps we'd get round to it after a while. Get power and class-envy out of the world, and some genius, like as not, would invent a post-graduate course of colleges for human nature. All things are possible."