"I didn't say that. So far as I can see you can keep on just the same. There are twenty-four hours in every day. But make that phase secondary. I don't discount writers in the least or their work; but with the world as it is the main chance doesn't lie that way--and it's the main chance we're all after. Fish or no fish, I tell you some time you'll find this out for yourself. To get the most out of life a man must be in the position to pass current wherever he may be. In the millennium the standard may be different--I for one sincerely hope it will be; but in the twentieth century dollars are the key that unlocks everything. Without them you're as helpless as a South Sea islander in a metropolitan street. You're at the mercy of every human being that wants to give you a kick; and the majority will give it to you if they see you are defenceless." Armstrong was still smiling, the same being a smile not pleasant to see. "Now that I've got you going," he commented, "I've a curiosity to have you keep on. You're certainly stirring with a vengeance to-night, Darley." "And accomplishing nothing. Strange as it may seem to you, I'm serious." "I don't doubt it, old man." Of a sudden the smile had passed. "I can't adjust my point of view to yours at all. If I thought dollars were the end of existence I'd quit the game now. If the world has come to this--" "The world hasn't come to it and never will. You simply can't or won't see the point. I repeat, that of themselves they're nothing, but they're the means to everything. Get your competency first, your balance-wheel, your independence, your established base of supplies; then plan your campaign. The world is big, infinitely big, to the human being who can command. It's a little mud ball to the other who has to dance whenever some one else whistles." "And how about happiness, the thing we're all after?" "It isn't happiness, but it's the means to it. There can be no happiness without independence." "Even marital happiness?" "That most of all. I tell you the lack of a sufficient income is the rock on which most married people go to pieces. It isn't the only one, but it's the most frequent. I've seen and I know." "You'd drive our old friend Cupid out of business, Darley. You don't give him an inch of ground to stand on." "On the contrary, I keep him in business indefinitely--" "Moreover, the examples of the rich, scattered broadcast through the daily papers, hardly bear you out." "They are the exception that proves the rule. Nine hundred and ninety-nine poor couples come to grief, and the world never hears of it. In the thousandth case a rich man and woman make fools of themselves and the world reads the scandal next morning. The principle is unaltered. The exceptions, the irresponsibles whether rich or poor, are something to which no rule applies."