human
I never quite know how far you are serious, and how far you are just amusing yourself, Hadria, said Lady Engleton.
gpt
Our talking of Greece reminds me of some remark you made the other day, about Helen. You seemed to me almost to sympathize with her.
human
If a slave breaks his chains and runs, I am always glad,
gpt
I was talking about Helen.
human
So was I. If a Spartan wife throws off her bondage and defies the laws that insult her, I am still more glad.
gpt
But not if she sins?
human
Yes; if she sins.
gpt
Oh, Hadria,
human
I don't see that it follows that Helen _did_ sin, however; one does not know much about her sentiments. She revolted against the tyranny that held her shut in, enslaved, body and soul, in that wonderful Greek world of hers. I am charmed to think that she gave her countrymen so much trouble to assert her husband's right of ownership. It was at _his_ door that the siege of Troy ought to be laid. I only wish elopements always caused as much commotion!
gpt
Well, that _is_ a strange idea! And do you really think Helen did not sin? Seriously now.
human
I don't know. There is no evidence on that point.
gpt
You do amuse me. Assuming that Helen did not sin, I suppose you would (if only for the sake of paradox) accuse the virtuous Greek matrons--who sat at home, and wove, and span, and bore children--of sinning against the State!
human
Certainly, said Hadria, undismayed.
gpt
It was they who insidiously prepared the doom for their country, as they wove and span and bore children, with stupid docility. As surely as an enemy might undermine the foundations of a city till it fell in with a crash, so surely they brought ruin upon Greece.
human
Oh, Hadria, you are quite beside yourself to-day!
gpt
A love of paradox will lead you far! said Lady Engleton.
human
We have always been taught to think a nation sound and safe whose women were docile and domestic.
gpt
What nation, under those conditions, has ever failed to fall in with a mighty crash, like my undermined city? Greece herself could not hold out. Ah, yes; we have our revenge! a sweet, sweet revenge!
human
I never heard anyone say so many dreadful things in so short a space of time, she cried.
gpt
You are distinctly shocking.
human
I am frank, said Hadria.
gpt
I fancy we should all go about with our hair permanently on end, if we spoke out in chorus.
human
I don't quite like to hear you say that, Hadria.
gpt
I mean no harm--merely that every one thinks thoughts and feels impulses that would be startling if expressed in speech. Don't we all know how terrifying a thing speech is, and thought? a chartered libertine.
human
Why, you are saying almost exactly what Professor Theobald said the other day, and we were so shocked.
gpt
And yet my meaning has scarcely any relation to his, Hadria hastened to say.
human
He meant to drag down all belief in goodness by reminding us of dark moments and hours; by placarding the whole soul with the name of some shadow that moves across it, I sometimes think from another world, some deep under-world that yawns beneath us and sends up blackness and fumes and strange cries. Hadria's eyes had wandered far away.
gpt
Are you never tormented by an idea, an impression that you know does not belong to you?
human
Professor Fortescue, come and tell me what you think of this strange doctrine?
gpt
If we had to be judged by our freedom from rushes of evil impulse, rather than by our general balance of good and evil wishing, I think those would come out best, who had fewest thoughts and feelings of any kind to record.
human
Unless goodness is only a negative quality, Valeria pointed out,
gpt
Yes, and it is liable to go under too sometimes, one must not forget, said Hadria,
human
But what else do we mean when we talk by common consent of the world's baseness, harshness, vulgarity, injustice? It means surely--and think of it!--that it is composed of men and women with the best of them killed out, as a nerve burnt away by acid; a heart won over to meaner things than it set out beating for; a mind persuaded to nibble at edges of dry crust that might have grown stout and serviceable on generous diet, and mellow and inspired with noble vintage.
gpt
You really are shockingly Bacchanalian to-day,
human
Metaphorically, I am a toper. The wonderful clear sparkle, the subtle flavour, the brilliancy of wine, has for me a strange fascination; it seems to signify so much in life that women lose.
gpt
True. What beverage should one take as a type of what they gain by the surrender?
human
Oh, toast and water!
gpt
Back flew iterative telegraph posts with Herculean swing, into the Past, looped together in rhythmic movement, marking the pulses of old Time. On, with rack and roar, into the mysterious Future. One could sit at the window and watch the machinery of Time's foundry at work; the hammers of his forge beating, beating, the wild sparks flying, the din and chaos whirling round one's bewildered brain;--Past becoming Present, Present melting into Future, before one's eyes. To sit and watch the whirring wheels; to think
human
Now it is thus and thus; presently, another slice of earth and sky awaits me