Fahrenheit 451 Captain Beatty's Speech

Captain Beatty says these lines toward the end of “The Hearth and the Salamander” while explaining the history of fireman to Montag. Beatty’s whole speech has an ironic sound. He is willing to defend the “equalization” of society while still remaining educated himself, and denounces the use of books as weapons while freely using them that way himself. Because of these ambiguities, Beatty is the most complex character in the book, and uses his book-educated mind to manipulate Montag.