Answer

“ My dear Sir,—The inquiry which your favor of yesterday contains is so made up of statements and inferences—so very general in some respects, and so imperfect in others—that an answer to it which expresses neither more nor less than the truth must be more specific than you seem to ask. ”

“ We may have known, in the course of our lives, a few people who, when we ask them a question, think before they answer. These are the people who habitually say to themselves, "In view of this question and of the truth which I should speak, what words should issue from my lips?" ”

“ If thou canst, answer me. If thou hast so much strength and spirit left thee, and art not quite spent with the distemper and the dispute, set thy words in order, and they shall have their due consideration." Those that can speak reason will hear reason. ”

“ When, in an examination, we put a definite question to the person examined, we may reasonably expect an answer. But if we were to ask him to tell us in one answer all he had learnt during his whole life, he would either not know how in the world to begin, or, like those who rescue things from a fire, he would tell us important and unimportant alike without any arrangement, and both very imperfectly. ”

“ Your shrewd question has anticipated the subject, which even if you had said nothing must have arisen from our discourse, and therefore I do not doubt that it will be effectually grasped by your minds, since indeed your sharp wits have outstripped our instruction. For the puzzle of any question is easily removed, when the inquiry anticipates the answer, and is the first to travel along the road which it is to follow. ”

“ If you will allow me to define a reasonable question as one which is asked in terms of ideas justified by previous experience, without itself contradicting that experience, then we may say, as the result of our investigation, that to every reasonable question there is an intelligible answer, which either we or posterity may know. ”

“ The answer to every question which it is possible to frame, must be contained in a Proposition, or Assertion. Whatever can be an object of belief, or even of disbelief, must, when put into words, assume the form of a proposition. ”

“ The answer is, that the objects of thought about which we make judgments are suppositions, and our judgments {88} concern their fulfilment, and their fulfilment is a relation external to them—it is their agreement or disagreement with reality. ”

“ They guess at the wishes of the person who asks them, and answer according to his, and not according to their own, opinion. But as we know that you are good judges, and will say exactly what you think, we have taken you into our counsels. ”

“ CHAPTER XIII THE ADVERBIAL CLAUSE OF CAUSE
Function.—In our daily experience we are continually meeting new conditions, discovering new truths. It is human nature to be curious as to the causes of these truths and conditions, hence there is no question perhaps which is asked oftener than the query of the scientist, the persistent question of the child, why? So common is this question that in our speech we anticipate its coming and answer it before it is asked. When we make statements of facts or of our opinions, we seem to foresee that we shall be asked why? ”

“ So shall we come to look at the world with new eyes. It shall answer the endless inquiry of the intellect,—What is truth? and of the affections,—What is good? by yielding itself passive to the educated Will. ”

“ A conscientious examination shows that all the various ways of explaining what is actually meant by a question are, ultimately, nothing but various descriptions of Ways in which the answer to the question must be found. Every explanation or indication of the meaning of a question consists, in some way or other, of prescriptions for finding its answer. ”

“ It is highly important that questions shall be asked so that they demand thought in answering, and usually so that the answer must be given in a full statement. Seldom should a question be asked in such form that a simple Yes or No will answer it. ”

“ We get wise by asking questions, and even if these are not answered we get wise, for a well-packed question carries its answer on its back as a snail carries its shell. ”

“ And, to be short, make an Oration.
But thou shalt answer, Lord, for me.
Yet when the houre of thy designe
To answer these fine things shall come;
Speak not at large; say, I am thine:
And then they have their answer home. ”

“ Now, before one sets out to answer a question it is well to find out whether it is a sensible question to ask and a sensible question to try to answer. He who asks: Where is the middle of an infinite line? ”

“ You are trying to recognize that you have been given the answer by recognizing the problem, so that the problem and the answer can be brought together and you can be at peace.
The shorter practice periods for today will not be set by time, but by need. You will see many problems today, each one calling for an answer. Our efforts will be directed toward recognizing that there is only one problem and one answer. ”

“ One can but answer such questions in the most fragmentary and tentative way, relying for the most part on the opinions and information of those who know, those who are in the van of action, at home and abroad, but also on one's own personal impressions of an incomparable scene. ”

“ These proofs, and this exhortation, carry such light and force in them, as may be reasonably expected to have an effect upon all men: yet to the WISE, who are prompted by their curiosity, to habits of inquiry, to ask a reason of the hope that is in us10, and who are qualified by their parts and studies to judge of such reason, we are instructed to address a more elaborate answer, or apology. ”

“ a question only where there is an answer, and this only where something can be said. ”

“ Plain question and plain answer make the shortest road out of most perplexities. ”

“ When a question is asked, to which he can reply without injury to his pronounced opinion, how eagerly he answers. But when a query is propounded, which his knowledge shows him in a moment, indicates a reply which his quick intelligence sees will be against his side, what does he do? ”

“ If you will be candid, and bring your mind into a suitable condition to be reasoned with, we will call you to the consideration of questions which, if properly answered, will lead us into the true light of our subject. ”

“ The questions which this gentleman asked me, and similar kinds of questions, are being asked over and over again by people all over the country. The question can be answered only by our putting our consciences into our work, and by our being entirely unselfish in it. ”

“ What is man? In how many different senses is good employed? A dialectic question is one to which the respondent makes sufficient reply by saying, Yes or No.391 You must ask in this form: Is the definition of man so and so? Is good enunciated in this or that different sense? To these questions the respondent may answer Yes or No. But if he persists in negative answers to your multiplied questions as to this or that sense of the term good, you may perhaps stand excused for asking him: “In how many different senses, then, do you yourself use the term good?”392 ”

“ The Reply is an admirable specimen of the way in which a controversy should be conducted; without heat, the writer uniformly mindful of his object, which is not personal distinction, but the conviction of his neighbour, poor as well as rich, all the facts in order, every point answered, and not one evaded. ”

“ Their conversation is direct, searching, and terribly honest. Many of their questions bring pain, they strike so keenly upon the wrongs in our world. I am used to answering complicated questions—theirs possess the simplicity that comes directly from the heart. ”

“ You will find these seven words——Proposition, Attribute, Term, Subject, Predicate, Particular, Universal——charmingly useful, if any friend should happen to ask if you have ever studied Logic. Mind you bring all seven words into your answer, and your friend will go away deeply impressed——'a sadder and a wiser man'. ”

“ Since, then, the objects of all Belief and of all Inquiry express themselves in propositions; a sufficient scrutiny of Propositions and of their varieties will apprize us what questions mankind have actually asked of themselves, and what, in the nature of answers to those questions, they have actually thought they had grounds to believe. ”

“ These tiresome questions continue to be asked, and never answered,—but answers are clamoured for, and the people complain—and then one fierce day the gods hear them grumble, and begin to grumble back! ”

“ but if it be reduced to one simple proposition, I fancy it may then have an answer.’—‘O sir,’ cried the ’Squire, ‘I am your most humble servant, I find you want me to furnish you with argument and intellects too. ”

“ Some, at least, either fill the vacuum by stereotyped answers, or become conscious of unanswered questions of transcendent moment. By those who know much, more than by those who know little, is there felt the need for explanation. ”

“ That you should be able to ask a question clearly, is two-thirds of the way to getting it answered; ”

“ How delightful is the breeze:—so very sweet; and there is a sound in the air shrill and summerlike which makes answer to the chorus of the cicadae. But the greatest charm of all is the grass, like a pillow gently sloping to the head. ”

“ If you concentrate on these questions and on finding the answers, and do it diligently, you will be surprised to see how the true answers will come to you, and how much clearer they will become as you put them into daily practice. ”

“ But the fugue we are now discussing is for two parts only; and after the first entry of the answer, the exposition (§ 11) is complete, and we reach the first episode, where, as we shall see later, modulation usually begins. There is, therefore, here no occasion to return to the tonic key. The same reason may probably explain the putting the second answer into the key of the subdominant, noticed in § 111. Students should always keep to the regular rule, and answer a subject modulating to the dominant by a return to the tonic. ”

“ The rule to be found in nearly every work on fugue respecting tonal answer is, that if a subject leaps from tonic to dominant, either direct or through the third of the tonic, the answer must be tonal—that is to say, the tonic must be answered by the dominant, and the dominant by the tonic. ”

“ The question was summed up for him thus: “If I do not accept the answers Christianity gives to the problems of my life, what answers do I accept?” ”

“ Will you deny that the time has come when a solution of this question must be arrived at, a question, the reply to which embodies all that which, at the present moment, excites human sympathies down to their lowest depths? ”

“ We all know the trick of it. If we want to tell the substance of a conversation, a sermon, a lecture, we ‘go over it in our minds’ first and the mind puts its question to itself, the same question over and over again, no more than,—What next?—and lo, we have it, the whole thing complete! ”

“ We must decide those questions as a matter of calm study and judgment in the light of human experience. It is the judgment that should tell us whether a thing is right or wrong. And how shall we know whether it is right or wrong? ”

“ Taking it for granted, as any sensible man in the circumstances would, that something should be done, he puts the question, “What shall I do?” A right question, addressed to the proper person, himself. ”

“ In brief (whether you lay more stress upon deeds and their outcome, or upon experiences and their contents) , any expression of opinion, made at any time, is an appeal of the self of the moment to the verdict, to the estimate, to the experience of a larger and better informed insight, in the light of which the self of the moment proposes to be judged. The special criteria by which your momentary opinion is tested, at the time when you form that opinion, vary endlessly with your mood and your training and your feelings, and with the topics and tasks in which you happen to be interested. ”

“ Every object has its appointed number of attributes, neither more nor less. To every question, whether it is this or that, there is, for any one who is thoroughly acquainted with it, a decisive Yes possible, or a decisive No,—so that there is an end of all doubt or hesitation on the subject. ”

“ To talk therefore of objections and replies, and ballancing of arguments in such a question as this, is to confess, either that human reason is nothing but a play of words, or that the person himself, who talks so, has not a Capacity equal to such subjects. ”

“ I would ask of my friends or foes, no matter which—I mean those who do not believe as I do—those who look upon us as a set of fanatics, I would ask a few questions of the world of mankind, of the greatest philosophers, of the greatest geniuses, and of the men of the most profound knowledge on the face of the earth, Can you tell me where you get your knowledge? ”

“ That fruitful thinking—thought that terminates in valid knowledge—goes on in terms of the distinction of facts and judgment, and that valid knowledge is precisely genuine correspondence or agreement, of some sort, of fact and judgment, is the common and undeniable assumption. ”