A spasm of irritation shook him. He could not determine where their machinations ended and his own over-active intelligence began the work of conject… - Mary McCarthy

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A spasm of irritation shook him. He could not determine where their machinations ended and his own over-active intelligence began the work of conjecture — it was the old philosophical stickler: how to distinguish the mind's knowledge of its objects from its experience of its own processes? In short, can we know anything, he muttered under his breath.