We have as much war as ever.
MANDEVILLE. There was never such a social turmoil.
THE YOUNG LADY. The artistic part of our nature does not appear to
have grown.
THE FIRE-TENDER. We are quarreling as to whether we are in fact
radically different from the brutes.
HERBERT. Scarcely two people think alike about the proper kind of
human government.
THE PARSON. Our poetry is made out of words, for the most part, and
not drawn from the living sources.
OUR NEXT DOOR. And Mr. Cumming is uncorking his seventh phial. I
never felt before what barbarians we are.
THE MISTRESS. Yet you won't deny that the life of the average man is
safer and every way more comfortable than it was even a century ago.
THE FIRE-TENDER. But what I want to know is, whether what we call
our civilization has done any thing more for mankind at large than to
increase the ease and pleasure of living? Science has multiplied
wealth, and facilitated intercourse, and the result is refinement of
manners and a diffusion of education and information. Are men and
women essentially changed, however? I suppose the Parson would say
we have lost faith, for one thing.
MANDEVILLE. And superstition; and gained toleration.
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