y is over, and naturally one feels
pretty sick."

"Do you still write short stories?"

"Because your English has gone to the devil. You think and talk in
Journalese. Define a great thinking mass."

Rickie sat up and adjusted his floral crown.

"Estimate the worth of a general feeling."

Silence.

"And thirdly, where is the great world?"

"Oh that--!"

"Yes. That," exclaimed Ansell, rising from his couch in violent
excitement. "Where is it? How do you set about finding it? How long does
it take to get there? What does it think? What does it do? What does
it want? Oblige me with specimens of its art and literature." Silence.
"Till you do, my opinions will be as follows: There is no great world at
all, only a little earth, for ever isolated from the rest of the little
solar system. The earth is full of tiny societies, and Cambridge is one
of them. All the societies are narrow, but some are good and some are
bad--just as one house is beautiful inside and another ugly. Observe the
metaphor of the houses: I am coming back to it. The good societies say,
`I tell you to do this because I am Cambridge.' The bad ones say, `I
tell you to do that because I am the great world, not because I am
'Peckham,' or `Billingsgate,' or `Park Lane,' but `because I am the
great world.' They lie. And fools like you listen to them, and believe
that they are a thing which does not exist and never has existed, and
confuse 'great,' which has no meaning whatever, with 'good,' which means
salvation. Look at this great wreath: it'll be dead tomorrow. Look
at that good flower: it'll come up again next year. Now for the other
metaphor. To compare the world to Cambridge is like comparing the
outsides of houses with the inside of a house. No intellectual effort is
needed, no moral result is attained. You only have to say, 'Oh, what
a difference!' and then come indoors again and exhibit your broadened
mind."

"I never shall come indoors again," said Rickie. "That's the whole
point." And his voice began to quiver. "It's well enough for those
who'll get a Fellowship, but in a few weeks I shall go down. In a few
years it'll be as if I've never been up. It matters very much to me what
the world is like. I can't answer your questions about it; and that's
no loss to you, but so much the worse for me. And then you've got a
house--not a metaphorical one, but a house with father and sisters. I
haven't, and never shall have. There'll never again be a home