There is the statement: “this pencil is five inches long”, and the statement, “I feel that this pencil is five inches long”, and we must get clear about the relation of the grammar of the first statement to the grammar of the second. To the statement “I feel in my hand that the water is three feet under the ground”

15.

we should like to answer: “I don't know what this means”. But the diviner would say: “surely you know what it means. You know what “three feet under the ground” means, and you know what “I feel” means.” But I should answer him: “I know what a word means in certain contexts. Thus I understand the phrase ‘three feet under the ground’, say, in the connections, ‘the measurement has shown that the water runs three feet under the ground’, ‘If we dig three feet deep we are going to strike water’, ‘the depth of the water is three feet by the eye’. But the use of the expression ‘a feeling in my hands of water being three feet under the ground’ has yet to be explained to me.”

(2015–) Wittgenstein Source Bergen Nachlass Edition (WS-BNE). Edited by the Wittgenstein Archives at the University of Bergen under the direction of Alois Pichler. In: Wittgenstein Source, curated by Alois Pichler (2009–) and Joseph Wang-Kathrein (2020–). (N) Bergen: WAB.