"And so," said Ellis, getting up and stretching himself, "even by your own confession we end where we began."
"Not quite," I replied. "Besides, have we ended?"
For some minutes it seemed as though we had. The mid-day heat (it was now twelve o'clock) and the silence broken only by the murmur of the fountain (for the mowers opposite had gone home to their dinner) seemed to have induced a general disinclination to the effort of speech or thought Even Dennis whom I had never known to be tired in body or mind, and who was always debating something—it seemed to matter very little what—even he, I thought at first, was ready to let the discussion drop. But presently it became clear that he was only revolving my last words in his mind, for before long he turned to me and said:
"I don't know what you mean by 'interrogating experience,' or what results you hope to attain by that process." At this Leslie pricked up his ears, and I saw that he at least was as eager as ever to pursue the subject further.
"Why," continued Dennis, "should there not be a method of discovering Good independently of all experience?"
The phrase immediately arrested Wilson's attention.
"'A method independent of experience,'" he cried, "why, what kind of a method would that be?"
"It is not so easy to describe," replied Dennis. "But I was thinking of the kind of method, for example, that is worked out by Hegel in his Logic?"
"I have never read Hegel," said Wilson. "So that doesn't convey much to my mind."
"Well," said Dennis, "I am afraid I can't summarize him!"