‘And facts are what they teach in their colleges?’ asked Phaelon. ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘for they have heard that knowledge is power, and they desire power, and they think that knowledge consists of information.’ ‘I have seen them myself, Socrates,’ said Agathon, ‘running about as students, boasting of the number of courses they could take and of the daily information that they could gather into notebooks.’ ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘they are complacent, and are sure that when they have information they will instinctively act wisely and well. For we must remember that in a democracy men love to think they themselves are deciding the great questions of life and of the State. And in America they are very much on their dignity in this, being resolved to judge for themselves from the facts, of which they love to speak, and not to value the opinion of each other.’ ‘Except of experts, Socrates,’ said Agathon. ‘Indeed, they value experts because experts, they think, know the facts. And so two rules are to be observed carefully by all who would make the Americans think one thing rather than another. First you must call yourself an expert and second you must call everything you say the facts.’ ‘And then all will go well with you?’ asked Lysis. ‘Indeed, yes, for none of them know anything about the matters in hand and so they are prepared to hear that the facts are anything in the world.’ ‘Well, Socrates,’ said Phaelon, ‘it sounds to me a fine pastime to go persuading these great herds of barbarians that Persians are finer people than Greeks.’ ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘they could easily be made to believe that or any other piece of nonsense.’ ‘Would it not be fun?’ said Phaelon eagerly. ‘I must do it. Nor will I fear the perils of the country. I will go boldly among them as becomes a Greek, resisting their hold-up men with my sword and opposing their cars with my shield.’ ‘You must take care,’ I said, ‘that they do not fell you from behind with a card-index.’ ‘Card-index?’ said Phaelon; ‘what weapon is that?’ ‘It is more than a weapon to the Americans,’ I said: ‘it is everything. It is the symbol of their way of life and they intend shortly to put it on all their coins, and stamps. It is like a plank to a drowning sailor, for by its means they survive in the great heaving oceans of facts with which they would otherwise be overwhelmed. Or you may think of them as a nation of Ariadnes.’ ‘That is certainly a more pleasant picture,’ said Agathon, ‘and for my part I will take care to think of them like that. For as Ariadne had a thread whereby her lover might find his way out of the Labyrinth, so have the Americans card-indexes to prevent themselves from getting wholly lost in the modern world.’ At this Phaelon exclaimed: ‘I should dearly love to see what was inside a card-index.’