Give them a chance. Give them money. Don't dole them out poetry-books
and railway-tickets like babies. Give them the wherewithal to buy these
things. When your Socialism comes it may be different, and we may think
in terms of commodities instead of cash. Till it comes give people
cash, for it is the warp of civilisation, whatever the woof may be. The
imagination ought to play upon money and realise it vividly, for it's
the--the second most important thing in the world. It is so slurred over
and hushed up, there is so little clear thinking--oh, political economy,
of course, but so few of us think clearly about our own private incomes,
and admit that independent thoughts are in nine cases out of ten the
result of independent means. Money: give Mr. Bast money, and don't
bother about his ideals. He'll pick up those for himself."

She leant back while the more earnest members of the club began to
misconstrue her. The female mind, though cruelly practical in daily
life, cannot bear to hear ideals belittled in conversation, and Miss
Schlegel was asked however she could say such dreadful things, and what
it would profit Mr. Bast if he gained the whole world and lost his own
soul. She answered, "Nothing, but he would not gain his soul until
he had gained a little of the world." Then they said, "No, we do not
believe it," and she admitted that an overworked clerk may save his soul
in the superterrestrial sense, where the effort will be taken for the
deed, but she denied that he will ever explore the spiritual resources
of this world, will ever know the rarer joys of the body, or attain to
clear and passionate intercourse with his fellows. Others had attacked
the fabric of Society--Property, Interest, etc.; she only fixed her eyes
on a few human beings, to see how, under present conditions, they could
be made happier. Doing good to humanity was useless: the many-coloured
efforts thereto spreading over the vast area like films and resulting in
an universal grey. To do good to one, or, as in this case, to a few, was
the utmost she dare hope for.

Between the idealists, and the political economists, Margaret had a
bad time. Disagreeing elsewhere, they agreed in disowning her, and
in keeping the administration of the millionaire's money in their
own hands. The earnest girl brought forward a scheme of "personal
supervision and mutual help," the effect of which was to alter poor
people until they became exactly like people who were not