“Now the trouble,” observed Morton, as the two discussed that backward popularity of the present rule, “lies in this: Your purist of politics is never practical. He walks the air; and for a principle, he fixes his eyes on a star. Besides,” concluded Morton, tapping the Reverend Bronson's hand with that invaluable eyeglass, “you make a pet, at the expense of statutes more important, of some beggarly little law like the law against gambling.” “My dear sir,” exclaimed the Reverend Bronson, “surely you do not defend gambling.” “I defend nothing,” said Morton; “it's too beastly tiresome, don't y' know. But, really, the public is no fool; and with a stock-ticker and a bucket shop on every corner, you will hardly excite folk to madness over roulette and policy.” “The policy shops stretch forth their sordid palms for the pennies of the very poor,” said the Reverend Bronson earnestly. “But, my boy,” retorted Morton, his drooping inanity gaining a color, “government should be concerned no more about the poor man's penny than the rich man's pound. However, if it be a reason, why not suppress the barrooms? Gad! what more than your doggery reaches for the pennies of the poor?” “There is truth in what you say,” consented the Reverend Bronson regretfully. “Still, I count for but one as an axman in this wilderness of evil; I can fell but one tree at a time. I will tell you this, however: At the gates of you rich ones must lie the blame for most of the immoralities of the town. You are guilty of two wrongs: You are not benevolent; and you set a bad moral example.” “Really!” replied Morton, “I, myself, think the rich a deuced bad lot; in fact, I hold them to be quite as bad as the poor, don't y' know. But you speak of benevolence--alms-giving, and that sort of thing. Now I'm against benevolence. There is an immorality in alms just in proportion as there's a morality to labor. Folk work only because they lack money. Now you give a man ten dollars and the beggar will stop work.” “Let me hear,” observed the Reverend Bronson, amused if not convinced, “what your remedy for the town's bad morals would be.” “Work!” replied Morton, with quite a flash of animation. “I'd make every fellow work--rich and poor alike. I'd invent fardels for the idle. The only difference between the rich and the poor is a difference of cooks and tailors--really! Idleness, don't y' know, is everywhere and among all classes the certain seed of vice.” “You would have difficulty, I fear,” remarked the Reverend Bronson, “in convincing your gilded fellows of the virtuous propriety of labor.” “I wouldn't convince them, old chap, I'd club them to it. It is a mistake you dominies make, that you are all for persuading when you should be for driving. Gad! you should never coax where you can drive,” and Morton smiled vacantly. “You would deal with men as you do with swine?”