ROBERT TRUEFIT. That's a specimen of old Jimmy's flattery, sir. I don't see what good I could do in Parliament. I've got to work for my living, and that takes up all my time; if I were in Parliament, I should have to get money somehow to support my wife and family, and it isn't in my blood to become a pensioner. Besides, I should be contented enough with what's called 'the ruling powers,' if they'd only turn their attention more to such social questions as this. Mr. MERRYWHISTLE. Ah, I'm glad of that; I'm glad you're not a republican. ROBERT TRUEFIT. Not I, sir--though I don't know what I might become by and by; for there's no denying that things are unequal, and that working men are talking of this inequality more and more every year. You'd be surprised to know what they think about this and that. And although I don't go so far as some of them do, I can't help agreeing with them in many things. Mr. MERRYWHISTLE. But what do they want? Equality? Such a thing is impossible. ROBERT TRUEFIT. I know it is. You'd have to do away with brains before you got that; though there _are_ a many who believe that it is to be arrived at. Some of them are fools, and some of them are rogues; but some of them have really worked themselves up into absolute belief. Mr. MERRYWHISTLE. Discontented people are to be found everywhere, and under any form of government. ROBERT TRUEFIT. Ay, that's the way a great many sum up; when they say that, they think they have found out the cause, and that the matter is settled. 'Tisn't the sensible way to view it. Mr. MERRYWHISTLE. What is the reason, then, of this spread of feeling among working-men? ROBERT TRUEFIT. That's a large question, and would take too long to answer. But I think the penny newspaper is partly accountable for it. They can afford to buy the penny and halfpenny newspaper, and they read them, and talk more among themselves. You see, things press upon them. They are arriving at a sort of belief that the laws are made more for the protection and benefit of property than for the protection and benefit of flesh and blood; and as _their_ value in the market doesn't lie in land and money, but in bone and muscle, the idea isn't pleasant to them. Mr. MERRYWHISTLE. But surely they are not right in this idea?