'I would have nothing at all. People only do what they want to do--and
what they are capable of doing. If they were capable of anything else,
there would be something else.' Again Gerald pondered. He was not going to take offence at Birkin.
'Don't you think the collier's PIANOFORTE, as you call it, is a symbol
for something very real, a real desire for something higher, in the
collier's life?' 'Higher!' cried Birkin. 'Yes. Amazing heights of upright grandeur. It
makes him so much higher in his neighbouring collier's eyes. He sees
himself reflected in the neighbouring opinion, like in a Brocken mist,
several feet taller on the strength of the pianoforte, and he is
satisfied. He lives for the sake of that Brocken spectre, the
reflection of himself in the human opinion. You do the same. If you are
of high importance to humanity you are of high importance to yourself.
That is why you work so hard at the mines. If you can produce coal to
cook five thousand dinners a day, you are five thousand times more
important than if you cooked only your own dinner.' 'I suppose I am,' laughed Gerald.
'Can't you see,' said Birkin, 'that to help my neighbour to eat is no
more than eating myself. "I eat, thou eatest, he eats, we eat, you eat,
they eat"--and what then? Why should every man decline the whole verb.
First person singular is enough for me.' 'You've got to start with material things,' said Gerald. Which
statement Birkin ignored.
'And we've got to live for SOMETHING, we're not just cattle that can
graze and have done with it,' said Gerald.
'Tell me,' said Birkin. 'What do you live for?' Gerald's face went baffled.
'What do I live for?' he repeated. 'I suppose I live to work, to
produce something, in so far as I am a purposive being. Apart from
that, I live because I am living.' 'And what's your work? Getting so many more thousands of tons of coal
out of the earth every day. And when we've got all the coal we want,
and all the plush furniture, and pianofortes, and the rabbits are all
stewed and eaten, and we're all warm and our bellies are filled and
we're listening to the young lady performing on the pianoforte--what
then? What then, when you've made a real fair start with your material
things?' Gerald sat laughing at the words and the mocking humour of the other
man. But he was cogitating too.
'We haven't got there yet,' he replied. 'A good many people are still
waiting for the rabbit and the fire to cook it.' 'So while you get the coal I must chase the rabbit?' said Birkin,
mocking at Gerald.