TREBELL. Bribe them with the means of equal efficiency. The crux of the whole matter will be in the statutes I'll force on those colleges. WEDGECROFT. They'll want dogma. TREBELL. Dogma's not a bad thing if you've power to adapt it occasionally. WEDGECROFT. Instead of spending your brains in explaining it. Yes, I agree. TREBELL. [_With full voice._] But in the creed I'll lay down as unalterable there shall be neither Jew nor Greek . . What do you think of St. Paul, Gilbert? WEDGECROFT. I'd make him the head of a college. TREBELL. I'll make the Devil himself head of a college, if he'll undertake to teach honestly all he knows. WEDGECROFT. And he'll conjure up Comte and Robespierre for you to assist in this little _rechauffée_ of their schemes. TREBELL. Hullo! Comte I knew about. Have I stolen from Robespierre too? WEDGECROFT. [_Giving out the epigram with an air._] Property to him who can make the best use of it. TREBELL. And then what we must do is to give the children power over their teachers? _Now he is comically enigmatic._ WEDGECROFT _echoes him_. WEDGECROFT. And what exactly do you mean by that? TREBELL. [_Serious again._] How positive a pedagogue would you be if you had to prove your cases and justify your creed every century or so to the pupils who had learnt just a little more than you could teach them? Give power to the future, my friend . . not to the past. Give responsibility . . even if you give it for your own discredit. What's beneath trust deeds and last wills and testaments, and even acts of Parliament and official creeds? Fear of the verdict of the next generation . . fear of looking foolish in their eyes. Ah, we . . doing our best now . . must be ready for every sort of death. And to provide the means of change and disregard of the past is a secret of statesmanship. Presume that the world will come to an end every thirty years if it's not reconstructed. Therefore give responsibility . . give responsibility . . give the children power. WEDGECROFT. [_Disposed to whistle._] Those statutes will want some framing. TREBELL. [_Relapsing to a chuckle._] There's an incidental change to foresee. Disappearance of the parson into the schoolmaster . . and the Archdeacon into the Inspector . . and the Bishop into--I rather hope he'll stick to his mitre, Gilbert. WEDGECROFT. Some Ruskin will arise and make him. TREBELL. [_As he paces the room and the walls of it fade away to him._] What a church could be made of the best brains in England, sworn only to learn all they could teach what they knew without fear of the future or favour to the past . . sworn upon their honour as seekers after truth, knowingly to tell no child a lie. It will come. WEDGECROFT. A priesthood of women too? There's the tradition of service with them. TREBELL. [_With the sourest look yet on his face._] Slavery . . not quite the same thing. And the paradox of such slavery is that they're your only tyrants.