`I believe as THIS world is 'ell,' said Crass, looking around with a philosophic expression.This opinion was echoed by most of the others, although Slyme remained silent and Owen laughed.
`Wot the bloody 'ell are YOU laughin' at?' Crass demanded in an indignant tone.
`I was laughing because you said you think this world is hell.'
`Well, I don't see nothing to laugh at in that,' said Crass.
`So it IS a 'ell,' said Easton.`There can't be anywheres much worse than this.'
`'Ear, 'ear,' said the man behind the moat.
`What I was laughing at is this,' said Owen.`The present system of managing the affairs of the world is so bad and has produced such dreadful results that you are of the opinion that the earth is a hell:
and yet you are a Conservative! You wish to preserve the present system - the system which has made the world into a hell!'
`I thought we shouldn't get through the dinner hour without politics if Owen was 'ere,' growled Bundy.`Bloody sickenin' I call it.'
`Don't be 'ard on 'im,' said Philpot.`'E's been very quiet for the last few days.'
`We'll 'ave to go through it today, though,' remarked Harlow despairingly.`I can see it comin'.'
`I'M not goin' through it,' said Bundy, `I'm orf!' And he accordingly drank the remainder of his tea, closed his empty dinner basket and, having placed it on the mantelshelf, made for the door.
`I'll leave you to it,' he said as he went out.The others laughed.
Crass, remembering the cutting from the Obscurer that he had in his pocket, was secretly very pleased at the turn the conversation was taking.He turned roughly on Owen:
`The other day, when we was talkin' about the cause of poverty, you contradicted everybody.Everyone else was wrong! But you yourself couldn't tell us what's the cause of poverty, could you?'
`I think I could.'
`Oh, of course, you think you know,' sneered Crass, `and of course you think your opinion's right and everybody else's is wrong.'
`Yes,' replied Owen.
Several men expressed their abhorrence of this intolerant attitude of Owen's, but the latter rejoined:
`Of course I think that my opinions are right and that everyone who differs from me is wrong.If I didn't think their opinions were wrong I wouldn't differ from them.If I didn't think my own opinions right I wouldn't hold them.'
`But there's no need to keep on arguin' about it day after day,' said Crass.`You've got your opinion and I've got mine.Let everyone enjoy his own opinion, I say.'
A murmur of approbation from the crowd greeted these sentiments; but Owen rejoined:
`But we can't both be right; if your opinions are right and mine are not, how am I to find out the truth if we never talk about them?'
`Well, wot do you reckon is the cause of poverty, then?' demanded Easton.
`The present system - competition - capitalism.'
`It's all very well to talk like that,' snarled Crass, to whom this statement conveyed no meaning whatever.`But 'ow do you make it out?'
`Well, I put it like that for the sake of shortness,' replied Owen.
`Suppose some people were living in a house -'
`More supposin'!' sneered Crass.
`And suppose they were always ill, and suppose that the house was badly built, the walls so constructed that they drew and retained moisture, the roof broken and leaky, the drains defective, the doors and windows ill-fitting and the rooms badly shaped and draughty.If you were asked to name, in a word, the cause of the ill-health of the people who lived there you would say - the house.All the tinkering in the world would not make that house fit to live in; the only thing to do with it would be to pull it down and build another.Well, we're all living in a house called the Money System; and as a result most of us are suffering from a disease called poverty.There's so much the matter with the present system that it's no good tinkering at it.
Everything about it is wrong and there's nothing about it that's right.There's only one thing to be done with it and that is to smash it up and have a different system altogether.We must get out of it.'
`It seems to me that that's just what you're trying to do,' remanded Harlow, sarcastically.`You seem to be tryin' to get out of answering the question what Easton asked you.'
`Yes!' cried Crass, fiercely.`Why don't you answer the bloody question? Wot's the cause of poverty?'
`What the 'ell's the matter with the present system?' demanded Sawkins.
`Ow's it goin' to be altered?' said Newman.
`Wot the bloody 'ell sort of a system do YOU think we ought to 'ave?'
shouted the man behind the moat.
`It can't never be altered,' said Philpot.`Human nature's human nature and you can't get away from it.'
`Never mind about human nature,' shouted Crass.`Stick to the point.
Wot's the cause of poverty?'
`Oh, b--r the cause of poverty!' said one of the new hands.`I've 'ad enough of this bloody row.' And he stood up and prepared to go out of the room.
This individual had two patches on the seat of his trousers and the bottoms of the legs of that garment were frayed and ragged.He had been out of work for about six weeks previous to having been taken on by Rushton & Co.During most of that time he and his family had been existing in a condition of semi-starvation on the earnings of his wife as a charwoman and on the scraps of food she brought home from the houses where she worked.But all the same, the question of what is the cause of poverty had no interest for him.
`There are many causes,' answered Owen, `but they are all part of and inseparable from the system.In order to do away with poverty we must destroy the causes: to do away with the causes we must destroy the whole system.'
`What are the causes, then?'
`Well, money, for one thing.'
This extraordinary assertion was greeted with a roar of merriment, in the midst of which Philpot was heard to say that to listen to Owen was as good as going to a circus.Money was the cause of poverty!
`I always thought it was the want of it!' said the man with the patches on the seat of his trousers as he passed out of the door.