“I would try to teach him better. If that failed, I would discharge him.”
“In what method and by what means would you endeavor to teach him?”
“By all the means that I could command. By precept and by example, by warning him of his faults and by showing him better ways, by wholesome books and good company.”
“And if he refused to learn; if he remained obstinate; if he mocked you and called you a hypocrite; if he claimed that his way was the best, in fact the only way, divinely inspired, and therefore beyond all criticism, then you would throw him out?”
“Certainly, and quickly! I should regard him as morally insane, and try my best to put him where he could do no more harm. But tell me why this protracted imitation of Socrates? Where are you trying to lead me? Do you want me to say that the German Kaiser is a very bad foreman of his shop; that he has got it into a horrible mess and made it despised and hated by all the other shops; that he ought to be put out? If that is your point, I am with you in advance.”
“Right you are!” cried Dick joyously. “Can the Kaiser! We all agree to that. And here the bout ends, with honors for both sides, and a special prize for the Governor.”
The professor smiled, recognizing in the name more affection than disrespect. He leaned forward in his chair, lighting a fresh cigar with gusto.
“Not yet,” he said, “O too enthusiastic youth! Our friend here has not yet come to the point at which I was aiming. The application of my remarks to the Kaiser—whom I regard as a gifted paranoiac—is altogether too personal and limited. I was thinking of something larger and more important. Do you give me leave to develop the idea?”
“Fire away, sir,” said Dick.
Hardman nodded his assent. “I should like very much to hear in what possible way you connect the misconduct of Germany, which I admit, with your idea of the present value of classical study, which I question.”