They were too cool-headed and courageous for that.

They were merely incredulous, that was all.

Ernest could not get them seriously to fear the coming of the Oligarchy.

They were stirred by him, but they were too sure of their own strength.

There was no room in their theoretical social evolution for an oligarchy, therefore the Oligarchy could not be.
"We'll send you to Congress and it will be all right," they told him at one of our secret meetings.
"And when they take me out of Congress," Ernest replied coldly, "and put me against a wall, and blow my brains out--what then ?" "Then we'll rise in our might," a dozen voices answered at once.
"Then you'll welter in your gore," was his retort.