"Mark my words! So long as we're on these lines, we shall do nothing.
It's going against evolution. They say Darwin's getting old-fashioned;
all I know is, he's good enough for me. Competition is the only thing."
"But competition," I said, "is bitter cruel, and some people can't stand
against it!" And I looked at him rather hard: "Do you object to putting
any sort of floor under the feet of people like that?"
He let his voice drop a little, as if in deference to my scruples.
"Ah!" he said; "but if you once begin this sort of thing, there's no end
to it. It's so insidious. The more they have, the more they want; and
all the time they're losing fighting power. I've thought pretty deeply
about this. It's shortsighted; it really doesn't do!"
"But," I said, "surely you're not against saving people from being
knocked out of time by old age, and accidents like illness, and the
fluctuations of trade?"
"Oh!" he said, "I'm not a bit against charity. Aunt Emma's splendid
about that. And Claud's awfully good. I do what I can, myself." He
looked at me, so queerly deprecating, that I quite liked him at that
moment. At heart--I felt he was a good fellow. "All I think is," he
went on, "that to give them something that they can rely on as a matter
of course, apart from their own exertions, is the wrong principle
altogether," and suddenly his voice began to rise again, and his eyes to
stare.
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