ii USELESS KNOWLEDGE 41 



speak what is in my mind, I must say that knowledge of 

 the Absolute or, what comes to the same, of the Un 

 knowable, seems to me to be of the kind you require. 

 Aristotle, no doubt, might speak similarly of your own 

 Idea of the Good. 



Oh, but I intended it to be supremely useful both in 

 knowledge and in action. 



No doubt you did, but because you were not able 

 to make this plain, Aristotle would not admit it to be 

 true. 



We had better let bygones be bygones. 



Very well ; let me in that case give you another 

 example, which now concerns us nearly, of knowledge 

 which seems false, because it seems useless. I mean 

 knowledge about the world in which we now are, 

 regarded with the eyes of those whom in a little while 

 I shall no longer dare to call benighted dwellers in the 

 Cave. Until we can make our world useful to them, it 

 is false : I am a liar and you are the unreal figments of 

 my creative imagination. 



You quite alarm me. Can you not devise a way, 

 then, whereby we might prove ourselves useful, and so 

 existent, to your friends ? 



Certainly. Could you not appear at a meeting of 

 the Society for Psychical Research and deliver a lecture, 

 in your beautiful Attic, on the immortality of the soul ? 

 That would be very useful ; it might induce some few 

 really to concern themselves with what is to befal them 

 after death, and lead them perhaps to amend their lives. 

 I know the Secretary of the Society quite well, and I 

 think we could arrange a good meeting for you ! 



Ev^tjpei wvOptoire. I could not think of such a 

 thing : it would be too degrading. Besides, to tell you 

 the truth, I have long ceased to feel any practical interest 

 in the generality of men and their world. I would do 

 something for you, but you already know and do not 

 need persuading. Can I not do something to benefit 

 you personally, whether it was useful, and therefore con 

 vincing, to others or not ? 



