"Miss Wright, time enough for that later," interrupted Burnett. "What we must know now, Mr. Hart, is how much you're willing to do for your new-found convictions? It will be more work than you've ever dreamed possible." He felt as exhilarated as he did in the months after High Holy Day. "I'm down to under ten hours labor a week. I'd do anything for your group if I could get more work." Burnett gave him a hearty handshake of congratulation ... but was frowning as he did so. "You're doing the right thing--for the wrong reason. Every member of this group could tell you why. Miss Wright, since you feel like talking, explain the matter." "Certainly. Mr. Hart, we are engaged in an activity of so-called subversion for a positive reason, not merely to avoid insufficient work load. Your reason shows you are still being moved by the values that you despise. We _want_ to cut the work-production load on people. We want them to _face_ the problem of leisure, not flee it." "There's a heart-warming paradox here," Burnett explained. "Every excess eventually undermines itself. Everybody in the movement starts by wanting to act for their beliefs because work appears so attractive for its own sake. I was that way, too, until I studied the dead art of philosophy." "Well--" Hart sat down, deeply troubled. "Look, I deplore destroying equipment that is still perfectly useful as much as any of you do. But there _is_ a problem. If the destruction were stopped there would be so much leisure people would rot from boredom." * * * * * Burnett pounced eagerly on the argument. "Instead they're rotting from artificial work. Boredom is a temporary, if recurring phenomenon of living, not a permanent one. If most men face the difficulty of empty time long enough they find new problems with which to fill that time. That's where philosophy showed me the way. None of its fundamental mysteries can ever be solved but, as you pit yourself against them, your experience and capacity for being alive grows." "Very nice," Hart grinned, "wanting all men to be philosophers. They never have been." "You shouldn't have brought him here," growled the short man. "He's not one of us. Now we have a real mess." "Johnson, I'm leader of this group!" Burnett exploded. "Credit me with a little understanding. All right, Hart, what you say is true. But why? Because most men have always worked too hard to achieve the fruits of curiosity." "I hate to keep being a spoil-sport, but what does that prove? _Some_ men who had to work as hard as the rest have been interested in things beyond the end of their nose." They all groaned their disapproval. "A good point, Hart, but it doesn't prove what you think. It just shows that a minority enjoy innate capacities and environmental variations that make the transition to philosopher easier." "And _you_ haven't proven anything about the incurious majority."