If it were not a
passion--if it were not the mightiest of the passions, all the other
passions would sweep it away like a leaf before a hurricane. It is the
birth of that passion that turns a child into a man.

ANN. There are other passions, Jack. Very strong ones.

TANNER. All the other passions were in me before; but they were idle
and aimless--mere childish greedinesses and cruelties, curiosities
and fancies, habits and superstitions, grotesque and ridiculous to the
mature intelligence. When they suddenly began to shine like newly lit
flames it was by no light of their own, but by the radiance of the
dawning moral passion. That passion dignified them, gave them conscience
and meaning, found them a mob of appetites and organized them into an
army of purposes and principles. My soul was born of that passion.

ANN. I noticed that you got more sense. You were a dreadfully
destructive boy before that.

TANNER. Destructive! Stuff! I was only mischievous.

ANN. Oh Jack, you were very destructive. You ruined all the young fir
trees by chopping off their leaders with a wooden sword. You broke all
the cucumber frames with your catapult. You set fire to the common: the
police arrested Tavy for it because he ran away when he couldn't stop
you. You--

TANNER. Pooh! pooh! pooh! these were battles, bombardments, stratagems
to save our scalps from the red Indians. You have no imagination, Ann. I
am ten times more destructive now than I was then. The moral passion has
taken my destructiveness in hand and directed it to moral ends. I have
become a reformer, and, like all reformers, an iconoclast. I no longer
break cucumber frames and burn gorse bushes: I shatter creeds and
demolish idols.

ANN. [bored] I am afraid I am too feminine to see any sense in
destruction. Destruction can only destroy.

TANNER. Yes. That is why it is so useful. Construction cumbers the
ground with institutions made by busybodies. Destruction clears it and
gives us breathing space and liberty.

ANN. It's no use, Jack. No woman will agree with you there.

TANNER. That's because you confuse construction and destruction with
creation and murder. They're quite different: I adore creation and abhor
murder. Yes: I adore it in tree and flower, in bird and beast, even
in you. [A flush of interest and delight suddenly clears the growing
perplexity and boredom from her face]. It was the creative instinct that
led you to attach me to you by bonds that have le