Page:Philosophy and Fun of Algebra.djvu/74

PHILOSOPHY AND FUN OF ALGEBRA to make two hypotheses to start with. We are going to try thinking of 'I Am' as Unity; one, and not several or a fraction. We will also try thinking of 'I Am' as No-Thing,—we are not going to suppose at present that any particular kind of thing made the rest; we will suppose that 'I Am' is not a thing. When we find that any particular proceeding or behaviour destroys men, or makes them too sickly or weak or stupid or quarrelsome to manage other creatures and keep the upper hand of the world, we will say, for short, that 'I Am' does not like or does not intend the people of Israël to go on with that kind of proceeding or behaviour.

"Now these two hypotheses are as much as we can deal with for the present. Anybody who wants to think out other hypotheses than those will have to think to himself, or go out of the country that I am to manage.

"Now we will arrange all the facts that we know round the statement of our own ignorance; and then try our hypotheses on them.

"We know that eating the flesh of certain 70