_Her_. I don't know what this particular net may be; your nets are all
round me, anyhow.

_Ly_. Well, try and get through; providentially, you are as good a
swimmer as can be. Now, this is it: granted that we go all round
experimenting, and get it done at last, too, I do not believe we shall
have solved the elementary question, whether _any_ of them has the
much-desired; perhaps they are all wrong together.

_Her_. Oh, come now! not one of _them_ right either?

_Ly_. I cannot tell. Do you think it impossible they may all be deluded,
and the truth be something which none of them has yet found?

_Her_. How can it possibly be?

_Ly_. This way: take a correct number, twenty; suppose, I mean, a man has
twenty beans in his closed hand, and asks ten different persons to guess
the number; they guess seven, five, thirty, ten, fifteen--various numbers,
in short. It is possible, I suppose, that one may be right?

_Her_. Yes.

_Ly_. It is not impossible, however, that they may all guess different
incorrect numbers, and not one of them suggest twenty beans. What say you?

_Her_. It is not impossible.

_Ly_. In the same way, all philosophers are investigating the nature of