Page:Emma Goldman - The Social Significance of the Modern Drama - 1914.djvu/33

 Oswald. Such talk as that won't go far with warmblooded young people, over head and ears in love.

Mrs. Alving. No, it wouldn't go far.

Manders. How can the authorities tolerate such things? Allow it to go on in the light of day? (To Mrs. Alving.) Had I not cause to be deeply concerned about your son? In circles where open immorality prevails, and has even a sort of prestige——!

Oswald. Let me tell you, sir, that I have been a constant Sunday-guest in one or two such irregular homes——

Manders. On Sunday of all days!

Oswald. Isn't that the day to enjoy one's self? Well, never have I heard an offensive word, and still less have I ever witnessed anything that could be called immoral. No; do you know when and where I have found immorality in artistic circles?

Manders. No! Thank heaven, I don't!

Oswald. Well, then, allow me to inform you. I have met with it when one or other of our pattern husbands and fathers has come to Paris to have a look around on his own account, and has done the artists the honor of visiting their humble haunts. They knew what was what. These gentlemen could tell us all about places and things we had never dreamed of.

Manders. What? Do you mean to say that respectable men from home here would——?

Oswald. Have you never heard these respectable men, when they got home again, talking about the way in which immorality was running rampant abroad?