That is all. He thought that since there had to
be national governments he would make one that was strong at home and
invincible abroad. Because he had fed with a kind of rough appetite upon
what we can see now were very stupid ideas, that does not make him
a stupid man. We've had advantages; we've had unity and collectivism
blasted into our brains. Where should we be now but for the grace of
science? I should have been an embittered, spiteful, downtrodden member
of the Russian Intelligenza, a conspirator, a prisoner, or an assassin.
You, my dear, would have been breaking dingy windows as a suffragette.'
'NEVER,' said Edith stoutly....
For a time the talk broke into humorous personalities, and the young
people gibed at each other across the smiling old administrator, and
then presently one of the young scientific men gave things a new turn.
He spoke like one who was full to the brim.
'You know, sir, I've a fancy--it is hard to prove such things--that
civilisation was very near disaster when the atomic bombs came
banging into it, that if there had been no Holsten and no induced
radio-activity, the world would have--smashed--much as it did. Only
instead of its being a smash that opened a way to better things, it
might have been a smash without a recovery.
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