Page:Father's memoirs of his child.djvu/137

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71

to his works of a more fanciful complexion, may probably increase the interest, as well as diversify the tenor of this narrative.

When he was a little more than five years old, Thomas, sitting at dinner with a knife in his hand, asked the following question. "Pray, Mother, what is the opposite to sharp?" He was answered, "Blunt, my dear." On this he immediately observed, "Then my knife is very blunt; for I cannot cut with it." His little brother Benjamin, two years younger, wished to have some share in the conversation, yet without perceiving thoroughly the drift of what had passed. He therefore enquired, "What is the opposite to a door?" His mother replied, "I know of no opposite to a door. The qualities or circumstances of persons or things, by which their resemblance or opposition is marked out, are usually expressed by adjectives. The noun substantive simply represents the person or thing itself." Thomas without hesitation interposed with this remark. "But there are opposites