You want the world changed--laws
upset, liberty destroyed, wages lowered, and so on--so that you can get
all the money. We want the world changed so that we can be healthy and
comfortable and happy--securely so--which we can't be unless everybody
is, or is in the way to being."

Jane was surprised to see that her father, instead of being offended,
was amused and pleased. He liked his new doctor so well that he liked
everything he said and did. Jane looked at Charlton in her friendliest
way. Here might be an ally, and a valuable ally.

"Human nature doesn't change," said Hastings in the tone of a man who
is stating that which cannot be disputed.

"The mischief it doesn't," said Charlton in prompt and vigorous
dissent. "When conditions change, human nature has to change, has to
adapt itself. What you mean is that human nature doesn't change
itself. But conditions change it. They've been changing it very
rapidly these last few years. Science--steam, electricity, a thousand
inventions and discoveries, crowding one upon another--science has
brought about entirely new and unprecedented conditions so rapidly that
the changes in human nature now making and that must be made in the
next few years are resulting in a series of convulsions. You
old-fashioned fellows--and the political parties and the
politicians--are in danger of being stranded. Leaders like Victor
Dorn--movements like our Workingmen's League--they seem new and radical
to-day. By to-morrow they'll be the commonplace thing, found
everywhere--and administering the public affairs."

Jane was not surprised to see an expression of at least partial
admission upon her father's face. Charlton's words were of the kind
that set the imagination to work, that remind those who hear of a
thousand and one familiar related facts bearing upon the same points.
"Well," said Hastings, "I don't expect to see any radical changes in my
time."

"Then you'll not live as long as I think," said Charlton. "We
Americans advance very slowly because this is a big country and
undeveloped, and because we shift about so much that no one stays in
one place long enough to build up a citizenship and get an education in
politics--which is nothing more or less than an education in the art of
living. But slow though we are, we do advance. You'll soon see the
last of Boss Kelly and Boss House--and of such gentle, amiable frauds
as our friend Davy Hull."

Jane laughed merrily. "Why