A teacher was left stunned after his class gave him a depressing answer to his riddle.

Teacher's riddle (c) Twitter

Teacher's riddle (c) Twitter

Bret Turner, who teaches first grade in California, asked the riddle: ''I am the beginning of everything, the end of everywhere. I'm the beginning of eternity, the end of time & space. What am I?''

Before giving the answer, which is ''e'', his students replied ''death'' which led to an ''awed, somber, reflective hush'' over his class.

Bret was so moved by their response, he posted the riddle on Twitter and wrote: ''The first guess from one of my 1st graders was 'death' and such an awed, somber, reflective hush fell over the class that I didn't want to tell them that actually the answer is the letter e, which just seemed so banal in the moment (sic)''