Imaginary. And no threat is ever quite imaginary. Anyone here disagree with

that? If you do, just ask yourself, What would this particular minority do if it

suddenly became the majority overnight? You see what I mean? Well, if you

don't — think it over!

"All right. Now along come the liberals — including everybody in this

room, I trust — and they say, 'Minorities are just people, like us.' Sure,

minorities are people — people, not angels. Sure, they're like us — but not

exactly like us; that's the all-too-familiar state of liberal hysteria in which

you begin to kid yourself you honestly cannot see any difference between a

Negro and a Swede...." (Why, oh why daren't George say "between Estelle

Oxford and Buddy Sorensen"? Maybe, if he did dare, there would be a great

atomic blast of laughter, and everybody would embrace, and the kingdom of

heaven would begin, right here in classroom . But then again, maybe it

wouldn't.)

"So, let's face it, minorities are people who probably look and act andthink

differently from us and hay faults we don't have. We may dislike the

way they look and act, and we may hate their faults. And it's better if we

admit to disliking and hating them than if we try to smear our feelings over

with pseudo liberal sentimentality. If we're frank about our feelings, we have

a safety valve; and if we have a safety valve, we're actually less likely to

start persecuting. I know that theory is unfashionable nowadays. We all keep

trying to believe that if we ignore something long enough it'll just vanish....

36

"Where was I? Oh yes. Well, now, suppose this minority does get

persecuted, never mind why — political, economic, psychological reasons.

There always is a reason, no matter how wrong it is — that's my point. And, of

course, persecution itself is always wrong; I'm sure we all agree there. But

the worst of it is, we now run into another liberal heresy. Because the

persecuting majority is vile, says the liberal, therefore the persecuted

minority must be stainlessly pure. Can't you see what nonsense that is?

What's to prevent the bad from being persecuted by the worse? Did all the

Christian victims in the arena have to be saints?

"And I'll tell you something else. A minority has its own kind of

aggression. It absolutely dares the majority to attack it. It hates the majority-

-not without a cause, I grant you. It even hates the other minorities, because all minorities are in competition: each one proclaims that its sufferings are

the worst and its wrongs are the blackest. And the more they all hate, and the

more they're all persecuted, the nastier they become! Do you think it makes

people nasty to be loved? You know it doesn't! Then why should it make

them nice to be loathed? While you're being persecuted, you hate what's

happening to You, you hate the people who are making it happen; you're in a

world of hate. Why, you wouldn't recognize love if you met it! You'd

suspect love! You'd think there was something behind it — some motive —

some trick…"

By this time, George no longer knows what he has proved or

disproved, whose side, if any, he is arguing on, or indeed just exactly what

he is talking about. And yet these sentences have blurted themselves out of

his mouth with genuine passion. He has meant every one of them, be they

sense or nonsense. He has administered them like strokes of a lash, to whip

Wally awake, and Estelle too, and Myron, and all of them. He who has ears

to hear, let him hear.

Wally continues to look embarrassed — but, no, neither whipped nor

awakened. And now George becomes aware that Wally's eyes are no longer

on his face; they are raised and focused on a point somewhere behind him,

on the wall above his head. And now, as he glances rapidly across the room,

faltering, losing momentum, George sees all the other pairs of eyes raised

also - focused on that damned clock. He doesn't need to turn and look for

himself; he knows he must be running overtime. Brusquely he breaks off,

telling them, "We'll go on with this on Monday." And they all rise instantly

to their feet, collecting their books, breaking into chatter.

Well, after all, what else can you expect? They have to hurry, most of

them, to get someplace else within the next ten minutes. Nevertheless,

George's feathers are ruffled. It's been a long time since last he forgot and let

37

himself get Up steam like this, right at the end of a period. How humiliating!

The silly enthusiastic old prof, rambling on, disregarding the clock, and the

class sighing to itself, He's off again! Just for a moment, George hates them,

hates their brute basic indifference, as they drain quickly out of the room.

Once again, the diamond has been offered publicly for a nickel, and they

have turned from it with a shrug and a grin, thinking the old peddler crazy.

So he smiles with an extra benevolence on those who have lingered

behind to ask him questions. Sister Maria merely wants to know if George,

when he sets the final examination, will require them to have read all of

those books which Mr. Huxley mentions in this novel. George thinks, How

amusing to tell her, yes, including The Days of Sodom. But he doesn't, of

course. He reassures her and she goes away happy, her academic load that

much lighter.

And then Buddy Sorensen merely wants to excuse himself. "I'm sorry,

sir. I didn't read the Huxley cause I thought you'd be going through it with

first." Is this sheer idiocy or slyness? George can't be bothered to find out.

"Ban the Bomb!" he says, staring at Buddy's button; and Buddy, to whom he

ha said this before, grins happily. "Yes, sir, you bet!"

Mrs. Netta Torres wants to know if Mr. Huxley hail an actual English