Louisa Sarah Bevington
Chiefly a Dialogue
(1895)
*************
About the print version:
PRICE ONE PENNY.
CHIEFLY A DIALOGUE. Concerning Some Difficulties of a Dunce.
London.
"Freedom" Office,
7 Lamb's Conduit Street, W.C.
1895.
***********
A DIALOGUE.
BY L.S. BEVINGTON.
Dunce.What is money?
The Other Fellow.Something rare and useless which you are compelled to obtain before
anyone will let you get at things that are needful, useful and plentiful.
Dunce.Oh! Then, I suppose, if you have not got any money you had better leave
off hoping for the plentiful things, and set to work to make what you want for
yourself.
Other Fellow.Why, old man, you can't!
Dunce.How's that? I feel as if I could.
Other Fellow.Not you. Money is there to stop you. It is a means used not only for
making it difficult for you to get at what is ready-made, but also for making it
dangerous for you to start digging or planting, or making what you want for
yourself.
Dunce.Then what on earth is money good for?
Other Fellow.Ah, that's where the joke comes in. Money is a device for enabling some
people to get at whatever they want without paying for it.
Dunce.What is paying?
Other Fellow.Damaging yourself in some way: parting with what you are in need of;
enduring something injurious; depriving yourself of health or strength or rest;
spending more than your exertions can restore to you; impoverishing your life in
some way. Money lets some people get all they want, and more too, by only
damaging other people; so that they themselves are not required to pay at all.
Dunce.Oh, but I shouldn't like to do that. Is there not enough of everything
in this great big world for everyone to get at what they are in want of without
damaging anyone?
Other Fellow.Yes; and now-a-days it can all be got at too. But, then, there's not
money enough to go round; and as I said before, you are bound to get money
before you will be allowed to get at anything better, or even to make and use
anything better, for yourself. And if no one gives you money which some one else
has paid for, you will have to pay for some yourself. But whether you are one of
the people who pay damage or no, when
you have once got money enough away from other people, you can bribe anyone with
it to let you have anything else you choose.
Dunce.What people are they who don't pay?
Other Fellow.Well, they have many names. They call themselves "noble" people, and
"gentle" people; "upper" people, "higher" people, the "best" people, and so on.
They speak of one another's "majesty," "highness," "grace," "holiness," and
"eminence"; and are addressed as "honorable," "reverend," "learned,"
"worshipful"; and, in the absence of the other epithets, never miss getting
themselves called "respectable."
Dunce.What pretty names! Why do they call themselves all that?
Other Fellow.Their god only knows. (There are three Ms and an N in their god's name.
Aye! And he is in the know, too; and "has mercy on them, miserable sinners.")
But they only call themselves by fancy names when money is not being inquired
about. When it is, and especially when they are thinking about the man in the
street, they call themselves Sovereigns, Legislators, Owners, Employers,
Pastors, Masters and Benefactors. And the man in the street is mostly careful to
get well out of the way of their carriages-and-pairs before he has the cheek to
nickname them Bosses, Exploiters, Sweaters, Parasites, Loafers and Frauds. They
are all men of means, that's why.
Dunce.What is a man of means?
Other Fellow.I told you before: men with money enough to procure necessaries,
comforts, luxuries, leisure and pleasure without paying for them and entirely at
other folk's expense; and then to force these folks to put up with them.
Dunce.But don't people pay for what money they have?
Other Fellow.Some do; some don't.
Dunce.Who have the most money; the people who pay for it, or the people who
don't?
Other Fellow.The people who don't. They are called "rich" people, because they get
more means than they can use up. They grow tall and live a long time, and are
very much respected.
Dunce.And what are the people called who pay for what money they have?
Other Fellow.They are called "poor" people. They spend their time, strength and
ability in making necessaries, comforts and luxuries to give the rich people.
They generally die early, and often miserably. They are not at all respected or
envied.
Dunce.Why do they spend themselves like that?
Other Fellow.To buy a little money with, from the rich people whom they make the
presents to. You see, they cannot have any food or clothing for themselves till
they have bought some money. And without any food or clothing they could not go
on spending their time and strength again to-morrow, and then the rich people
would miss their luxuries.
Dunce.But when they have bought enough money for their food and clothes, whom
do they give it to? where do the food and clothes come from?
Other Fellow.One question at a time, please. They don't give in the money where the
food and clothes come from. They give the money to some people who have custody
of the food and clothing, but who have not made it; and these people give a
little of the money to the poor people who have made the food and clothes,
keeping the rest for themselves. Sometimes the money is handed through several,
and what passes on gets less and less, so that the men who buy the last
shillings of it with the time and toil which they have spent away in providing
the good are, you see, poor men also. This way of going on is called "business."
Dunce.Stop! Let me understand. Then you mean to say that some rich folk, whom
for clearness I'll call Strong, Sons & Co., get the full produce of the poor
men's life-time and life-strength, and turn it into counters, and then hand back
a very few of the counters so that the poor men may have them as tickets for
useful stuff for Strong & Co. to-morrow; and then do you tell me that another
lot of rich people, whom we'll call Rong Brothers & Co., take the tickets as a
bribe for the clothes and food, and keep back part of the counters from the
other poor men who have made the clothes and food on like terms?
Other Fellow.Yes, that's something like how it is. Only you've got to recollect that,
with Strong, Sons & Co., over the way, insisting upon having everything they can
think of for nothing, and forcing everybody to take their counters in exchange
or go without, Messrs. Rong Brothers & Co. couldn't live at all (let alone live
idly or "respectably") if they did not stop some of the goods from going
straight where they are wanted, so as to be able to stop some of the counters
coming from the other direction. They then let the goods pass on their way on
condition of receiving more counters than they gave up in order to get the goods
into their custody. What do you think of it all?
Dunce.Why, if you ask me plainly, I think the rich men are impudent rogues,
and the poor men are damned fools. Which are you, sir, may I ask?
Other Fellow.Oh, I'm one of the damned fools, or I certainly should not have answered
your questions on the square. But, mark you, the impudence of the other gang is
legal. There's a deal in that. And it takes a clever dunce like you to find out
I am a fool. Most people think a man wise and prudent who puts up with what is
legal. But you're right; I am a fool.
Dunce.Legal! legal!--what's legal?
Other Fellow.Oh, come now! Have I got to explain that too? Legal means according to
Parliamentary law: the business way of managing to live by money, at the cost of
other people's lives and liberties is according to law, whether fools call it
impudence or not.
Dunce.Isn't there any plainer word to tell me what Parliamentary law is; and
why it makes people seem wise who put up with being impudently treated?
Other Fellow.Why, Parliamentary law is whatever a few score of fellow have settled
among themselves to make tens of millions of other people conform to; in fact,
everybody is made to conform who has not extra money enough to make ...
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