Moïse. “We think we are.”
Spook. “Ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha!! Listen! It takes what you call a hundred years for the light of some of the stars to reach the sphere you live in. So when you see a collision you may be watching a thing which really happened what you call a hundred years ago. For you it is the present time, because the rays of light have preserved it for you for all those things you call years. But you are looking at the past. Do you understand?”
Moïse. “I shall say, ‘I see the present,’ but if I know astronomy, by thinking a little I will be persuaded that I am not looking at a present thing but a past thing, because the rays have taken a long time to reach my eyes.”
Spook. “What I am trying to prove is this: even to your imperfect senses, the past can exist in the present, also the future can exist in the present.”
Moïse. “How? An example about the future, please, Sir.”
Spook. “Bless you! Your mathematicians, as you call them, can fix the next eclipse of the sun to the nearest second. Because they happen to have discovered the laws ruling that little portion of the field of knowledge, that portion of the future is known and is laid bare in the present. So, in a sense, past, present, and future co-exist.”
Moïse. “No, the knowledge of them co-exists.”
Spook. “Silly. Is the fire existing now, or merely your knowledge of it?”
Moïse. “The fire is existing now.”
Spook. “Because you see it?”