Page:Philosophy and Fun of Algebra.djvu/77

 CHAPTER XIV GO OUT OF MY CLASS-ROOM

is told of one of the orderly pupils of Mosaism who got to know a good deal about weather and electricity; and at last he got out of patience with the people who wanted to shout and argue. And he said to them: "What is the good of all this arguing backwards and forwards about things that we do not know and cannot settle? Let us try a fair experiment. You go on shouting and doing whatever you think the Unseen Powers like; and I will do what I think will get them to do what I like. And let us agree that whichever of us can draw a spark out of a thundercloud shall be considered to know most about how to come to an understanding with 'I Am.'"

So the other people shouted and jumped about, and cut themselves with knives; because they hid taken it into their heads to imagine that the Maker of things liked to see that kind of behaviour. 73