“It has no existence,” replied the tutor, complacently.
“But a billion dollars is inconceivable,” retorted the boy. “No mind can take in a sum of that size; but it exists.”
“Put that down! put that down!” shrieked the other boy. “You’ve struck something. If we get Berkeley on the paper, I’ll run that in.” He wrote rapidly, and then took a turn around the room, frowning as he walked. “The actuality of a thing,” said he, summing his clever thoughts up, “is not disproved by its being inconceivable. Ideas alone depend upon thought for their existence. There! Anybody can get off stuff like that by the yard.” He picked up a cork and a foot-rule, tossed the cork, and sent it flying out of the window with the foot-rule.
“Skip Berkeley,” said the other boy.
“How much more is there?”
“Necessary and accidental truths,” answered the tutor, reading the subjects from his notes. “Hume and the causal law. The duality, or multiplicity, of the ego.”
“The hard-boiled ego,” commented the boy the ruler; and he batted a swooping June-bug into space.
“Sit down, idiot,” said his sprightly mate.
Conversation ceased. Instruction went forward. Their pencils worked. The causal law, etc., went into their condensed notes like Liebig’s extract of beef, and drops of perspiration continued to trickle from their matted hair.