Collected Works. GEORGE BERNARD SHAW
[choking] No. I—[he collapses into the middle chair]. I must speak to you in private.
Confucius calmly withdraws.
BURGE-LUBIN. What on earth is it? Have some oxygen.
BARNABAS. I have had some. Go to the Record Office. You will see men fainting there again and again, and being revived with oxygen, as I have been. They have seen with their own eyes as I have.
BURGE-LUBIN. Seen what?
BARNABAS. Seen the Archbishop of York.
BURGE-LUBIN. Well, why shouldn't they see the Archbishop of York? What are they fainting for? Has he been murdered?
BARNABAS. No: he has been drowned.
BURGE-LUBIN. Good God! Where? When? How? Poor fellow!
BARNABAS. Poor fellow! Poor thief! Poor swindler! Poor robber of his country's Exchequer! Poor fellow indeed! Wait til I catch him.
BURGE-LUBIN. How can you catch him when he is dead? Youre mad.
BARNABAS. Dead! Who said he was dead?
BURGE-LUBIN. You did. Drowned.
BARNABAS [exasperated] Will you listen to me? Was old Archbishop Haslam, the present man's last predecessor but four, drowned or not?
BURGE-LUBIN. I don't know. Look him up in the Encyclopedia Britannica.
BARNABAS. Yah! Was Archbishop Stickit, who wrote Stickit on the Psalms, drowned or not?
BURGE-LUBIN. Yes, mercifully. He deserved it.
BARNABAS. Was President Dickenson drowned? Was General Bullyboy drowned?
BURGE-LUBIN. Who is denying it?
BARNABAS. Well, wave had moving pictures of all four put on the screen today for this American; and they and the Archbishop are the same man. Now tell me I am mad.
BURGE-LUBIN. I do tell you you are mad. Stark raving mad.
BARNABAS. Am I to believe my own eyes or am I not?
BURGE-LUBIN. You can do as you please. All I can tell you is that I don't believe your eyes if they cant see any difference between a live archbishop and two dead ones. [The apparatus rings, he holds the button down]. Yes?
THE WOMAN'S VOICE. The Archbishop of York, to see the President.
BARNABAS [hoarse with rage] Have him in. I'll talk to the scoundrel.
BURGE-LUBIN [releasing the button] Not while you are in this state.
BARNABAS [reaching furiously for his button and holding it down] Send the Archbishop in at once.
BURGE-LUBIN. If you lose your temper, Barnabas, remember that we shall be two to one.
The Archbishop enters. He has a white band round his throat, set in a black stock. He wears a sort of kilt of black ribbons, and soft black boots that button high up on his calves. His costume does not differ otherwise from that of the President and the Accountant General; but its color scheme is black and white. He is older than the Reverend Bill Haslam was when he wooed Miss Savvy Barnabas; but he is recognizably the same man. He does not look a day over fifty, and is very well preserved even at that; but his boyishness of manner is quite gone: he now has complete authority and self-possession: in fact the President is a little afraid of him; and it seems quite natural and inevitable that he should speak fast.
THE ARCHBISHOP. Good day, Mr President.
BURGE-LUBIN. Good day, Mr Archbishop. Be seated.
THE ARCHBISHOP [sitting down between them] Good day, Mr Accountant General.
BARNABAS [malevolently] Good day to you. I have a question to put to you, if you don't mind.
THE ARCHBISHOP [looking curiously at him, jarred by his uncivil tone] Certainly. What is it?
BARNABAS. What is your definition of a thief?
THE ARCHBISHOP. Rather an old-fashioned word, is it not?
BARNABAS. It survives officially in my department.
THE ARCHBISHOP. Our departments are full of survivals. Look at my tie! my apron! my boots! They are all mere survivals; yet it seems that without them I cannot be a proper Archbishop.
BARNABAS. Indeed! Well, in my department the word thief survives, because in the community the thing thief survives. And a very despicable and dishonorable thing he is, too.
THE ARCHBISHOP [coolly] I daresay.
BARNABAS. In my department, sir, a thief is a person who lives longer than the statutory expectation of life entitles him to, and goes on drawing public money when, if he were an honest man, he would be dead.
THE ARCHBISHOP. Then let me say, sir, that your department does not understand its own business. If you have miscalculated the duration of human life, that is not the fault of the persons whose longevity you have miscalculated. And if they continue to work and produce, they pay their way, even if they live two or three centuries.
BARNABAS. I know nothing about their working and producing. That is not the business of my department. I am concerned with their expectation of life; and I say that no man has any right to go on living and drawing money when he ought to be dead.
THE ARCHBISHOP. You do not comprehend the relation between income and production.
BARNABAS. I understand my own department.
THE ARCHBISHOP. That is not enough. Your department is part of a synthesis which embraces all the departments.
BURGE-LUBIN. Synthesis! This is an intellectual difficulty. This is a job for Confucius. I heard him use that very word the other day; and I wondered what the devil he meant. [Switching on] Hallo! Put me through to the Chief Secretary.
CONFUCIUS'S VOICE. You are speaking to him.
BURGE-LUBIN. An intellectual difficulty, old man. Something we don't understand. Come and help us out.
THE ARCHBISHOP. May I ask how the question has arisen?
BARNABAS. Ah! You begin to smell a rat, do you? You thought yourself pretty safe. You—
BURGE-LUBIN. Steady, Barnabas. Dont be in a hurry.
Confucius enters.
THE ARCHBISHOP [rising] Good morning, Mr Chief Secretary.
BURGE-LUBIN [rising in instinctive imitation of the Archbishop] Honor us by taking a seat, O sage.
CONFUCIUS. Ceremony is needless. [He bows to the company, and takes the chair at the foot of the table].
The President and the Archbishop resume their seats.
BURGE-LUBIN. We wish to put a case to you, Confucius. Suppose a man, instead of conforming to the official estimate of his expectation of life, were to live for more than two centuries and a half, would the Accountant General be justified in calling him a thief?
CONFUCIUS. No. He would be justified in calling him a liar.
THE ARCHBISHOP. I think not, Mr Chief Secretary. What do you suppose my age is?
CONFUCIUS. Fifty.
BURGE-LUBIN. You don't look it. Forty-five; and young for your age.
THE ARCHBISHOP. My age is two hundred and eighty-three.
BARNABAS [morosely triumphant] Hmp! Mad, am I?
BURGE-LUBIN. Youre both mad. Excuse me, Archbishop; but this is getting a bit—well—
THE ARCHBISHOP [to Confucius] Mr Chief Secretary: will you, to oblige me, assume that I have lived nearly three centuries? As a hypothesis?
BURGE-LUBIN. What is a hypothesis?
CONFUCIUS. It does not matter. I understand. [To the Archbishop] Am