"
It was a strange introduction. His listeners exchanged thoughtful
glances. But they all affirmed, and Sir Henry hitched his chair
almost impatiently.
"All right, Mr. Watson. Please proceed."
"To begin with," said Watson, "I assume that you all know of Dr.
Holcomb's announcement concerning the Blind Spot. You remember
that he promised to solve the occult; how he foretold that he
would prove it not by immaterial but by the very material means;
that he would produce the fact and the substance.
"Now, the professor had promised to deliver something far greater
than he had thought it to be. At the same time, what he knew of
the Blind Spot was part conjecture and part fact. Like his
forebears and contemporaries, he looked upon man as the real
being.
"But it's a question, now, as to which is reality and which is
not. There is not a branch of philosophy that looks upon the
question in that light. Bishop Berkeley came near and he has been
followed by others; but they all have been deceived by their own
sophistry. However, except for the grossest materialists, all
thinkers take cognizance of a hereafter.
"No one dreamed of a Blind Spot and what it may lead to, what it
might contain. We are five-sensed; we interpret the universe by
the measure of five yardsticks. Yet, the Blind Spot takes even
those away; the more we know, it seems, the less certain we are of
ourselves.
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