You do not know what that means ? You had better , then , ask the nearest Government pupil-teacher , who may possibly answer you smartly enough , thus - `` Amphibious . Adjective , derived from two Greek words , amphi , a fish , and bios , a beast . An animal supposed by our ignorant ancestors to be compounded of a fish and a beast ; which therefore , like the hippopotamus , ca n't live on the land , and dies in the water . '' However that may be , Tom was amphibious : and what is better still , he was clean . For the first time in his life , he felt how comfortable it was to have nothing on him but himself . But he only enjoyed it : he did not know it , or think about it ; just as you enjoy life and health , and yet never think about being alive and healthy ; and may it be long before you have to think about it ! He did not remember having ever been dirty . Indeed , he did not remember any of his old troubles , being tired , or hungry , or beaten , or sent up dark chimneys . Since that sweet sleep , he had forgotten all about his master , and Harthover Place , and the little white girl , and in a word , all that had happened to him when he lived before ; and what was best of all , he had forgotten all the bad words which he had learned from Grimes , and the rude boys with whom he used to play . That is not strange : for you know , when you came into this world , and became a land-baby , you remembered nothing . So why should he , when he became a water-baby ? Then have you lived before ? My dear child , who can tell ? One can only tell that , by remembering something which happened where we lived before ; and as we remember nothing , we know nothing about it ; and no book , and no man , can ever tell us certainly . There was a wise man once , a very wise man , and a very good man , who wrote a poem about the feelings which some children have about having lived before ; and this is what he said - `` Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting ; The soul that rises with us , our life 's star , Hath elsewhere had its setting , And cometh from afar : Not in entire forgetfulness , And not in utter nakedness , But trailing clouds of glory , do we come From God , who is our home . '' There , you can know no more than that . But if I was you , I would believe that . For then the great fairy Science , who is likely to be queen of all the fairies for many a year to come , can only do you good , and never do you harm ; and instead of fancying with some people , that your body makes your soul , as if a steam-engine could make its own coke ; or , with some people , that your soul has nothing to do with your body , but is only stuck into it like a pin into a pincushion , to fall out with the first shake ; -- you will believe the one true , orthodox , inductive , rational , deductive , philosophical , seductive , logical , productive , irrefragable , salutary , nominalistic , comfortable , realistic , and on-all-accounts-to-be-received doctrine of this wonderful fairy tale ; which is , that your soul makes your body , just as a snail makes his shell . For the rest , it is enough for us to be sure that whether or not we lived before , we shall live again ; though not , I hope , as poor little heathen Tom did .
For he went downward XXXXX the water : but we , I hope , shall go upward to a very different place .
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