“Looks bad for the Governor. Well, I’ve nothing against him. A good sort, in his way, and as he saw; a civilization that passes away with the rising flood. Good sort—but utterly without significance. No—I won’t go back. What a farce—to play the prodigal son! Why, Davy, I’ve lived! You haven’t, none of you has. I’ve lived—I’ve seen—I’ve been down in the depths and seen! And you’ve gone on playing at being eighteenth century Littledales, and never realizing that you don’t count! You don’t even realize what America—the new America—is!”
“I think I suspect it,” I said, surprised at the turn of the conversation. I had come, I think, rather patronizingly, and I found myself yielding to a mental supremacy.
“Your kind still believes in government by individuals; you can’t even see what’s coming. It’s mass that counts, to-day. I don’t say ‘majorities’: the world has always been governed by organized minorities, and it always will be. You don’t know your generation; I do; I’ve been one of them. I know what’s coming!”
“You don’t think much of our generation, I gather,” said I, startled at the way his thought had run with mine.
“Of the generation of our kind? Precious little!”
“Well, Alan—that’s about my way of thinking.”
“Honest?”
“Why not?” I said, amused.
“What’s happened to you?” he said, pulling at his chin. “Aren’t you satisfied with being a Littledale, with a Harvard accent, and a number of good clubs, and parading up and down this private preserve God made for you? You haven’t lost faith in your Divine right of being a Littledale? Good God—he has!”