Never Any Great Risk [Forster]

From Howards End, E. M. Forster, 1910.

'But after all,' she continued with a smile, 'there's
never any great risk as long as you have money.'

'Oh, shame! What a shocking speech!'

'Money pads the edges of things,' said Miss Schlegel.
'God help those who have none.'

'But this is something quite new!' said Mrs. Munt, who
collected new ideas as a squirrel collects nuts, and was
especially attracted by those that are portable.

'New for me; sensible people have acknowledged it for
years. You and I and the Wilcoxes stand upon money as upon
islands. It is so firm beneath our feet that we forget its
very existence. It's only when we see someone near us
tottering that we realize all that an independent income
means. Last night, when we were talking up here round the
fire, I began to think that the very soul of the world is
economic, and that the lowest abyss is not the absence of
love, but the absence of coin.'

'I call that rather cynical.'

'So do I. But Helen and I, we ought to remember, when we
are tempted to criticize others, that we are standing on
these islands, and that most of the others, are down below
the surface of the sea. The poor cannot always reach those
whom they want to love, and they can hardly ever escape from
those whom they love no longer. We rich can. Imagine the
tragedy last June, if Helen and Paul Wilcox had been poor
people, and couldn't invoke railways and motor-cars to part them.'