"Goethe says that matter cannot exist without spirit, or spirit without matter. Would you sub-scribe to that, Mr. Hardcastle?" "Partially. Matter can exist without spirit, which you may prove by getting under an avalanche; but I do most emphatically agree that spirit cannot exist without matter. 'Divorced from matter, where is life?' asks Tyndall, and nobody can answer him." "You misunderstand Goethe," declared Mr. May. "In metaphysics--" "I have no use for metaphysics. Believe me, the solemn humbug of metaphysics doesn't take in a policeman for a moment. Juggling with words never advanced the world's welfare or helped the cause of truth. What, for any practical purpose, does it matter how subjectively true a statement may be if it is objectively false? Life is just as real as I am myself--no more and no less--and all the metaphysical jargon in the world won't prevent my shins from bleeding wet, red blood when I bark them against a stone." "You don't believe in the supernatural then?" asked Mr. May. "Most emphatically not." "How extraordinary! And how, if I may ask, do you fill the terrible vacuum in your life that such a denial must create?" "I have never been conscious of such a vacuum. I was a sceptic from my youth up. No doubt those who were nurtured in superstition, when reason at last conquers and they break away, may experience a temporary blank; but the wonders of nature and the achievements of man and the demands of the suffering world--these should be enough to fill any blank for a reasonable creature." "If such are your opinions, you will fail here," declared the clergyman positively. "Why do you feel so sure of that?" "Because you are faced with facts that have no material explanation. They are supernatural, or supernormal, if you prefer the word." "'One world at a time,' is a very good motto in my judgment," replied Hardcastle. "We will exhaust the possibilities of this world first, sir." "They have already been exhausted. Only a simple, straightforward question awaits your reply. Do you believe in another world or do you not?" "In the endless punishment or the endless happiness of men and women after they are dead?" "If you like to confuse the issue in that way you are at liberty, of course, to do so. As a Christian, I cannot demur. The problem for the rationalist is this: How does he ignore the deeply rooted and universal conviction that there is a life to come? Is such a sanguine assurance planted in the mind of even the lowest savage for nothing? Where did the aborigines win that expectation?"