S. The essence I mean is quite a different affair. It is a thing that has no matter. It has no substance nor solidity, large nor small, hot nor cold, long nor short.
F. Then what is the long and short of it?
S. Abstraction.
F. What do you say to a pitchfork as an abstraction?
S. A pitchfork would mean none in particular, but one in general, and would be a thing in abstraction.
F. It would be a thing in the haymow. What do you think of a red cow for an example?
S. A red cow, considered as an abstraction, would be an animal possessing neither hides nor horns, bones nor flesh; it would have no color at all, for its redness would be the mere counterfeit or imagination of such. It would neither go to pasture, chew cud, give milk, nor do anything of a like nature.
F. Nonsense! All the metaphysics under the sun wouldn’t make a pound of butter!