The Iron Heel

fe, and study and culture, had not been real. I had learned nothing but theories of life and society that looked all very well on the printed page,

ent families that had received those dividends and by that much had profited by Jackson's blood. If one man could be so monstrously treated and society move on its way unheeding, might not many men be so monstrously treated? I remembered Ernest's women of Chicago who toiled for ninety cents a week, and the child slaves of the Southern cotton mills h

ather. I could see the effect Ernest was beginning to have on him. And then there was the Bishop. When I had last seen him he had looked a sick man. He was at high nervous tension, and in his eyes there was unspeakable

transfigured, the apostle of truth, with shining brows and the fearlessness of one of Gods own angels, battling for the truth and the right, and battling for the succor of the poor and lonely and oppressed. And then there arose before me another figure, the Christ! He, too, had taken the part of the

t of his father, who had lied and stolen for him and been worked to death. And he himself had gone into the mills when he was ten! All my heart seemed bursting with desire to fold my

he did not know he was trapped. He met me with the conventional gayety and gallantry. He was ever a graceful man, diplomatic, tactful, and considerate. An

good nature vanished like a ghost. A sudden, frightful expression distorted his well-bred face. I felt the same alarm that I had felt when James Smith broke out. But Colonel Ingram did not curse. That was the slight diff

or taste on my part, and very inconsiderate. Did I not know that in his profession personal feelings did not count? H

have received da

I have a feeling that he should. But that has no

s scattered wits

anything to do wit

ong initial consonant

is head. "And yet we are supposed t

of it," he countered.

ofessionally now, ar

n he looked anxiously about him for a way of escap

l feelings to his professional feelings, may not th

Ingram had ingloriously bolted,

that matter, did I even mention them. I gave the actual facts of the case, the long years Jackson had worked in the mills, his effort to save the machinery from damag

was then serving his apprenticeship as reporter on the most influential of the three newspapers.

"We have nothing to do with t

s it polic

u couldn't get any such matter into the papers. A man who tried to smuggle it in would l

your function is to twist truth at the command of your emp

, myself, do not write untruthful things. I keep square all right with my own conscience. Of course, there's lots that'

t an editor's desk some

dened by that tim

d, tell me what you think right now

kick over the ropes if he's going to succeed in

d his young

right?" I

course it's all right, because it c

t was aching for the youth of him, and I felt

d I was aware of a thrill of sympathy for the whining lawyer who had ingloriously fought his case. But this tacit conspiracy grew large. Not alone was it aimed against Jackson. It was aimed against

rue. But there was Jackson, and Jackson's arm, and the blood that stained my gown and dripped from my own roof-beams. An

ethic.* They talked in large ways of policy, and they identified policy and right. And to me they talked in fatherly ways, patronizing my youth and inexperience. They were the most hopeless of all I had encountered in my quest. They believed absolutely that their conduct was right. There was no question abou

ard was born, John

wrote: "Wherever th

tion of the morali

d its class feelin

st and related my experience. He looked

gent, except the large capitalist, and he isn't, if you'll pardon the Irishism.* You see, the masters are quite sure that they are right in what they are doing. That is the crow

ions, called BULLS,

f the anci

he human mind is that the wish is parent to the thought. No matter what they want to do, the sanction always comes. They are superficial casuists. They are Jesuitical. They even see their way to doing wrong that right may come of it. One of the pleasant and axiomatic fictions

in 1902 of that

hracite Coal Trust,

the following princ

aboring man will b

om God in His infin

interests of

was also a biologist and a sociologist would know, approximately, the right thing to do for humanity. But, outside the realm of business, these men are stupid. They know only business. They do not know ma

es, and by the sea. They were tended by armies of servants, and their social activities were bewildering. They patronized the university and the churches, and the pastors especially bowed at their knees in me

ed in a restricted s

ote the gilded dron

themselves at the

e business men nor

SOCIETY. SOCIETY wa

led not and who i

tainted money,"

he Church duri

esponsibilities of the rich. They were swayed by the same ethic that dominated their husbands-

hem flatly to assist Jackson, they as flatly refused. The astounding thing about it was that they refused in almost identically the same language, and this in face of the fact that I interviewed them separately and that one did not know that I had seen or was go

the OUTLOOK, a cri

er dated August 18,

orkingman losing hi

imilar to those o

by Avis

sanction, in their own class-ethic, for every act they performed. As I drove away from Mrs. Pertonwaithe's great house, I looked back