“Well, then, the thing to do is to get at the public mind--to get the people into the right, way of regarding these things. It is no good effecting temporary reforms in certain limited directions by outbursts of popular feeling; for just as soon as the public indignation cools down, back come the abuses. And so they will do inevitably until the people get up to a calm, high level of intelligence about the management of such affairs as they have in common.” “Quite so,” remarked Horace. “Of course all this is trite commonplace,” continued Reuben. “You can read it in any newspaper any day. My point is in the application of it. It’s all well enough to say these things in a general way. Everybody knows they are true; nobody disputes them any more than the multiplication-table. But the exhortation does no good for that very reason. Each reader says: ‘Yes, it’s too bad that my neighbors don’t comprehend these things better;’ and there’s an end to the matter. Nothing is effected, because no particular person is addressed. Now, my notion is that the way to do is to take a single small community, and go at it systematically--a house-to-house canvass, so to speak--and labor to improve its intelligence, its good taste, its general public attitude toward its own public affairs. One can fairly count on at least some results, going at it in that way.” “No doubt,” said the junior partner, smiling faintly. “Well, then, I’ve got a scheme for a sort of society here--perhaps in the nature of a club--made up of men who have an interest in the town and who want to do good. I’ve spoken to two or three about it. Perhaps it is your coming--I daresay it is--but all at once I feel that it is time to start it. My notion is it ought to establish as a fundamental principle that it has nothing to do with anything outside Thessaly and the district roundabout. That is what we need in this country as much as anything else--the habit of minding our own immediate business. The newspapers have taught us to attend every day to what is going on in New York and Chicago and London and Paris, and every other place under the sun except our own. That is an evil. We have become like a gossiping woman who spends all her time in learning what her neighbors are doing, and lets the fire go out at home. Now, I like to think this can be altered a good deal, if we only set to work at it. You have been abroad; you have seen how other people do things, and have wider notions than the rest of us, no doubt, as to what should be done. What do you say? Does the idea attract you?” Horace’s manner confessed to some surprise. “It’s a pretty large order,” he said at last, smilingly. “I’ve never regarded myself as specially cut out for a reformer. Still, there’s a good deal in what you say. I suppose it is practicable enough, when you come really to examine it.”