I said they were very pretty.

He thought he had tempted me.
"Hang on as long as you can, for the sake of the Party." I spoke playfully of the Party (a man in my position, with one eye on Time and the other on Eternity, develops an acute sense of values) and Raggles held up horrified hands.

To Raggles the Party is the Alpha and Omega of things human and divine.

It is the guiding principle of the Cosmos.

I could have spoken disrespectfully of the British Empire, of which he has a confused notion; I could have dismissed the Trinity, on which his ideas are vaguer, with an airy jest; in the expression of my views concerning the Creator, whom he believes to be under the Party's protection, I could have out-Pained Tom Paine, out-Taxiled Leo Taxil, and he would not have winced.