“But is that a sure way of going to work?” “’Tis the only thing he can do,” replied the Doctor, after a pause, and rubbing his forehead as if he was not altogether satisfied that his foundation was a solid one. My grandfather might have posed him with another question, but he poked the fire and let him go on. “Metaphysics, to speak exactly—” “Ah,” interrupted the schoolmaster, “bring it down to vulgar fractions, and then we shall understand it.” “’Tis the consideration of immateriality, or the mere spirit and essence of things.” “Come, come,” said Aunt Judy, taking a pinch of snuff, “now I see into it.” “Thus, man is considered, not in his corporeality, but in his essence or capability of being; for a man metaphysically, or to metaphysical purposes, hath two natures, that of spirituality and that of corporeity, which may be considered separate.” “What man?” asked Uncle Tim. “Why any man; Malachi there, for example, I may consider him as Malachi spiritual or Malachi corporal.” “That is true,” said Malachi, “for when I was in the militia, they made me a sixteenth corporal, and I carried grog to the drummer.” “That is another affair,” said the Doctor, in continuation, “we speak of man in his essence; we speak also of the essence of locality, the essence of duration—” “And essence of peppermint,” said Aunt Judy. “Pooh!” said the Doctor, “the essence I mean is quite a different concern.” “Something too fine to be dribbled through the worm of a still,” said my grandfather. “Then I am all in the dark again,” rejoined Aunt Judy. “By the spirit and essence of things I mean things in the abstract.” “And what becomes of a thing when it gets into the abstract?” asked Uncle Tim. “Why, it becomes an abstraction.” “There we are again,” said Uncle Tim; “but what the deuce is an abstraction?” “It’s a thing that has no matter; that is, it cannot be felt, seen, heard, smelt or tasted; it has no substance or solidity; it is neither large nor small, hot nor cold, long nor short.” “Then what is the long and short of it?” asked the schoolmaster. “Abstraction,” replied the Doctor. “Suppose, for instance,” said Malachi, “that I had a pitchfork—” “Ay,” said the Doctor, “consider a pitchfork in general; that is, neither this one nor that one, nor any particular one, but a pitchfork or pitchforks divested of their materiality—these are things in the abstract.” “They are things in the hay-mow,” said Malachi. “Pray,” said Uncle Tim, “have there been many such things discovered?” “Discovered!” returned the Doctor, “why all things, whether in heaven or upon the earth, or in the waters under the earth, whether small or great, visible or invisible, animate or inanimate; whatever the eye can see, or the ear can hear, or the nose can smell, or the fingers touch; finally, whatever exists or is imaginable in _rerum natura_, past, present or to come, all may be abstractions.”