“Then you’ve accepted his offer?,” I asked. “You’re giving up the House?” “I’m committed in principle,” he answered. “Yes, I shan’t stand again: this coupon business leaves no scope for the independent member. Why the prime minister wants an election at all, when his position is impregnable . . .” “He wants to keep it impregnable,” I said. “Well, you’re going in with Raymond to succeed where Deryk Lancing and his father and every millionaire in history has so far failed? It’s easier to make money honestly than to spend it wisely, you’ll find. How much is there?” “About twelve hundred thousand a year.” “You can do a lot of harm with that,” I said. “How will you spend it?” “For the first year or two it’s ear-marked for universities and hospitals.” “And after that?” “We might make the war worth while,” he laughed. “But you must help. The trouble with England at present is that we’ve so little sense of responsibility. Isn’t it about time we educated people up to a civic conscience? In the war, I admit . . .” “You found a hundred men who would die for their country to one who would live for it.” “Because, in peace, we call people ‘good citizens’ if they obey the laws and pay their taxes. That’s not enough for a civilized state, George! Good God, when a man commits murder, we hire another man to hang him! It’s you and I who ought to be hanged for not teaching him our own reverence for law. We hire people to persecute other people for beating their wives or neglecting their children or concealing their diseases! It’s _we_ who ought to be persecuted. Illness, to me, is the wound inflicted on society by the indifference of the healthy. Poverty. Degradation.” . . . “And your civic conscience . . .?,” I reminded him. “Another word for imagination! You’d be ashamed of yourself if your tenants in Ireland died of want; if the men drank or the women turned prostitutes. Yet I’ve seen sights in different parts of the world that would make your blood run cold. Famines and pestilences and massacres. Things we don’t allow in England: we’ve got _that_ far. Now it’s time we went farther. If the war’s to be worth while, you must satisfy yourself that what has been saved was worth saving.” “But how on earth are you to do it?”