"I came to the conclusion that I was a fool, lower in the scale of
intelligence than even the police of the modern romancer. Novelists
build mountains of stupidity out of a footprint on the sand, or from
an impression of a hand on the wall. That's the way innocent men
are brought to prison. It might convince an examining magistrate or
the head of a detective department, but it's not proof. You writers
forget that what the senses furnish is not proof. If I am taking
cognisance of what is offered me by my senses I do so but to bring
the results within the circle of my reason. That circle may be the
most circumscribed, but if it is, it has this advantage--it holds
nothing but the truth! Yes, I swear that I have never used the
evidence of the senses but as servants to my reason. I have never
permitted them to become my master. They have not made of me that
monstrous thing,--worse than a blind man,--a man who sees falsely.
And that is why I can triumph over your error and your merely animal
intelligence, Frederic Larsan.
"Be of good courage, then, friend Rouletabille; it is impossible
that the incident of the inexplicable gallery should be outside the
circle of your reason.
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