“How can you prove it?”
“I do not need to prove it. I know it, and so does everybody who knows a stone.”
“You cannot know it,” I said, “unless you can give any rational reason for your belief.”
“I do not need to give any reasons for it. I am satisfied to know what I know.”
I saw that I could not get the better of her in this way, so I said—
“Will you have the kindness to imagine this stone to be a pumpkin?”
“Well, Mr Mulligan!” she answered, “if this gives you pleasure, I shall imagine it to be a pumpkin.”
“Now take a bite of it, my darling,” I said.
“I can’t, and you ought not to ask me anything so absurd.”
“But why can’t you?”