This exchange, occurring in the brief space between Monygham asking for help and relating his "scheme" to deceive Sotillo, involves the difference between false hope and true hope, the latter represented by the treasure. Nostromo, representing the innocent People, cannot imagine restoring society on the basis of anything but true hope, i.e, the "treasure." On the surface he is saying that he won't reveal his hoard (in an extreme way that evokes his growing slavery to it), but on the deeper level the line means that the People can't place their hope again in society, not as represented by the likes of Sotillo, Pedrito and Gamacho. The reason they can't is precisely because of what they now know: that there is no hope in societal relations, that they are exploitative, destructive and illusory, that all men are essentially men of "destructive rapacity." In Nostromo's remark we again find the symbolic notion of bringing the silver back ashore (i.e., restoring faith in social structures and crusading ideals), and it is again presented as being physically impossible.

Monygham, who has not yet related his scheme, agrees completely with Nostromo. His belief that the silver is irretrievably lost corresponds to the cynical conviction -- worthy of the Devil -- that no true hope is possible to mankind. It is the Devil's belief (and his limitation) that mankind's only fate is to be manipulated by false hope. In this sense Nostromo's secret knowledge of the silver on the Great Isabel corresponds symbolically to the People concealing what the Devil does not suspect: the incorruptible integrity of their character, which is the true hope and mankind's true value.