is better to give than to receive,
the ideal of liberty, the ideal of the brotherhood of man, the ideal of
the sanctity of human life, the ideal of what we call goodness, charity,
benevolence, public spirited-ness, the ideal of sacrifice for a cause,
the ideal of unity and unanimity--all the lot--all the whole beehive
of ideals--has all got the modern bee-disease, and gone putrid,
stinking.--And when the ideal is dead and putrid, the logical sequence
is only stink.--Which, for me, is the truth concerning the ideal of
good, peaceful, loving humanity and its logical sequence in socialism
and equality, equal opportunity or whatever you like.--But this time he
stinketh--and I'm sorry for any Christus who brings him to life again,
to stink livingly for another thirty years: the beastly Lazarus of our
idealism."

"That may be true for you--"

"But it's true for nobody else," said Lilly. "All the worse for them.
Let them die of the bee-disease."

"Not only that," persisted Levison, "but what is your alternative? Is it
merely nihilism?"

"My alternative," said Lilly, "is an alternative for no one but myself,
so I'll keep my mouth shut about it."

"That isn't fair."

"I tell you, the ideal of fairness stinks with the rest.--I have no
obligation to say what I think."

"Yes, if you enter into conversation, you have--"

"Bah, then I didn't enter into conversation.--The only thing is, I agree
in the rough with Argyle. You've got to have a sort of slavery again.
People are not MEN: they are insects and instruments, and their
destiny is slavery. They are too many for me, and so what I think
is ineffectual. But ultimately they will be brought to agree--after
sufficient extermination--and then they will elect for themselves a
proper and healthy and energetic slavery."

"I should like to know what you mean by slavery. Because to me it is
impossible that slavery should be healthy and energetic. You seem to
have some other idea in your mind, and you merely use the word slavery
out of exasperation--"

"I mean it none the less. I mean a real committal of the life-issue of
inferior beings to the responsibility of a superior being."

"It'll take a bit of knowing, who are the inferior and which is the
superior," said Levison sarcastically.

"Not a bit. It is written between a man's brows, which he is."

"I'm afraid we shall all read differently."

"So long as we're liars."

"And putting that question aside: I presume that yo