_Tommy._--No, sir, not that; for gentlemen never plough the ground or build houses.
_Mr Barlow._--Is he then superior in knowledge? Were you, who have been brought up a gentleman, superior to all the rest of the world when you came here?
_Tommy._--To be sure, sir; when I came here I did not know so much as I do now.
_Mr Barlow._--If then you, when you knew nothing, and could do nothing, thought yourself superior to all the rest of the world, why should you wonder, that men who really excel others in those things which they see absolutely necessary, should have the same good opinion of themselves? Were you to be in Greenland, for instance, how would you prove your own superiority and importance?
_Tommy._--I would tell them that I had always been well brought up at home.
_Mr Barlow._--That they would not believe. They would say that they saw you were totally unable to do anything useful--to guide a boat; to swim the seas; to procure yourself the least sustenance--so that you would perish with hunger, if they did not charitably afford you now and then a bit of whale or seal; and, as to your being a gentleman, they would not understand the word, nor would they comprehend why one man, who is naturally as good as his fellow-creature, should submit to the caprice of another, and obey him.
_Tommy._--Indeed, sir, I begin to think that I am not so much better than others, as I used to do.
_Mr Barlow._--The more you encourage that thought the more likely you are to acquire real superiority and excellence, for great and generous minds are less exposed to that ridiculous vanity than weak and childish ones.
A few evenings after this conversation, when the night was remarkably clear, Mr Barlow called his two pupils into the garden, where there was a long hollow tube suspended upon a frame. Mr Barlow then placed Tommy upon a chair, and bade him look through it, which he had scarcely done when he cried out, "What an extraordinary sight is this!" "What is the matter?" said Mr Barlow. "I see," replied Tommy, "what I should take for the moon were it not a great many times bigger, and so near to me that I can almost touch it." "What you see," answered Mr Barlow, smiling, "is the moon itself. This glass has indeed the power of making it appear to your eye as it would do could you approach a great deal nearer; but still it is nothing but the moon; and from this single experiment you may judge of the different size which the sun and all the other heavenly bodies would appear to have, if you could advance a great deal nearer to them."