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05 - Flatland- A Romance of Many Dimensions - Edwin Abbott Abbott · Classic Sci Fi Books - Daily

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Part one, Section eleven, concerning our priests. It is high time that
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I should pass from these brief and discursive notes about things in Flatland to the
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central event of this book, my initiation into the mysteries of space, that
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is my subject. All that has gone before is merely preface. For this
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reason I must omit many matters of which the explanation would not I flatter myself,
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be without interest for my readers, as for example, our method of
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propelling and stopping ourselves, although destitute of feet, the means by which we
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give fixity to structures of wood, stone or brick, although of course we
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have no hands, nor can we lay foundations as you can, nor avail
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ourselves of the lateral pressure of the earth. The manner in which the rain
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originates in the intervals between our various zones, so that the northern regions do
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not intercept the moisture from falling on the southern. The nature of our hills
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and mines, our trees and vegetables, our seasons and harvests, our alphabet
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and method of writing adapted to our linear tablets. These and a hundred other
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details of our physical existence I must pass over, Nor do I mention them
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now except to indicate to my readers that their omission proceeds not from forgetfulness on
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the part of the author, but from his regard for the time of the
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reader. Yet, before I proceed to my legitimate subject, some few final
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remarks will no doubt be expected by my readers upon those pillars and mainstays of
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the constitution of flatland, the controllers of our conduct and shapers of our destiny,
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the objects of universal homage and almost of adoration. Need I say that
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I mean our priests when I call them priests, Let me not be understood
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as meaning no more than the term denotes with you, with us. Our
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priests are administrators of all business, art and science, directors of trade,
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commerce, generalship, architecture, engineering, education, statesmanship, legislature, morality,
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theology. Doing nothing themselves, they are the causes of everything worth doing
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that is done by others. Although popularly everyone called a circle is deemed a
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circle, yet among the better educated classes it is known that no circle is
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really a circle, but only a polygon with a very large number of very
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small sides. In proportion to the number of the sides, the polygon approximates
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to a circle. And when the number is very great, say for example,
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three or four hundred, it is extremely difficult for the most delicate touch
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to feel any polygonal angles. Let me say rather, it would be difficult,
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for as I have shown above, recognition by feeling is unknown among the
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highest society, and to feel a circle would be considered a most audacious insult.
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This habit of abstention from feeling in the best society enables a circle the
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more easily to sustain the veil of mystery in which from his earliest years he
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is wont to enwrap. The exact nature of his perimeter or circumference, three
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feet being the average perimeter, it follows that in a polygon of three hundred
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sides, each side will be no more than the hundredth part of a foot
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in length, or little more than the tenth part of an inch, And
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in a polygon of six or seven hundred sides, the sides are little larger
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than the diameter of a spaceland pin head. It is always assumed, by
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courtesy that the chief circle for the time being has ten thousand sides. The
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ascent of the posterity of the circles in the social scale is not restricted,
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as it is among the lower regular classes, by the law of nature,
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which limits the increase of sides to one in each generation. If it were
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so, the number of sides in a circle would be a mere question of
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pedigree and arithmetic, and the four hundred and ninety seventh descendant of an equilateral
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triangle would necessarily be a polygon with five hundred sides. But this is not
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the case. Nature's law prescribes two antagonistic decrees affecting circular propagation. First,
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that as the race climbs higher in the scale of development, so development shall
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proceed at an accelerated Second, that in the same proportion, the race shall
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become less fertile. Consequently, in the home of a polygon of four or
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five hundred sides, it is rare to find a sun. More than one
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is never seen. On the other hand, the sun of a five hundred
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sided polygon has been known to possess five hundred, fifty or even six hundred
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sides. Art also steps in to help the process of the higher evolution.
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Our physicians have discovered that the small and tender sides of an infant polygon of
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the higher class can be fractured and his whole frame reset with such exactness that
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a polygon of two or three hundred sides sometimes by no means always, for
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the process is attended with serious risk, but sometimes overleaps two or three hundred
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generations, and, as it were, doubles at a stroke the number of
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his progenitors and the nobility of his descent. Many a promising child is sacrificed
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in this way. Scarcely one out of ten survives. Yet so strong is
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the parental ambition among those polygons who are, as it were, on the
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fringe of the circular class, that it is very rare to find a nobleman
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of that position in society who has neglected to place his firstborn son in the
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circular neo therapeutic gymnasium before he has attained the age of a month. One
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year determines success or failure. At the end of that time, the child
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has, in all probability added one more to the tombstones that crowd the neo
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therapeutic cemetery. But on rare occasions, a glad procession bears back the little
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one to his exultant parents, no longer a polygon but a circle. At
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LEAs least by courtesy, and a single instance of so blessed a result induces
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multitudes of polygonal parents to submit to similar domestic sacrifices which have a dissimilar issue
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Section twelve of the Doctrine of Our Priests. As to the doctrine of the
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Circles, it may briefly be summed up in a single maxim attend to your
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configuration, whether political, ecclesiastical, or moral. All their teaching has for
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its object the improvement of individual and collective configuration, with special reference, of
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course, to the configuration of the circles, to which all other objects are
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subordinated. It is the merit of the circles that they have effectually suppressed those
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ancient heresies which led men to waste energy and sympathy in the vain belief that
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conduct depends upon will, effort, training, encouragement, praise, or anything
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else but configuration. It was Pantocyclus, the illustrious Circle mentioned above as the
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Quella of the colour of Vault, who first convinced mankind that configuration makes the
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man. That, if, for example, you are born an Isosceles with
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two uneven sides, you will assuredly go wrong unless you have them made,
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even for which purpose you must go to the Isosceles hospital. Similarly, if
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you are a triangle or square, or even a polygon born with any irregularity,
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you must be taken to one of the regular hospitals to have your disease
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cured. Otherwise you will end your days in the state prison or by the
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angle of the state executioner. All faults or defects, from the slightest misconduct
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to the most flagitious crime. Pentocyclus attributed to some deviation from perfect regularity in
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the bodily figure, caused, perhaps if not congenital, by some collision in
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a crowd, by neglect to take exercise, or by taking too much of
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it, or even by a sudden change of temperature resulting in a shrinkage or
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expansion in some too susceptible part of the frame. Therefore concluded that illustrious philosopher,
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neither good conduct nor bad conduct, is a fit subject in any sober
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estimation for either praise or blame. For why should you praise, for example,
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the integrity of a square who faithfully defends the interests of his client,
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when you ought, in reality, rather to admire the exact precision of his
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rectangles, Or again, why blame allying thievish Isosceles when you ought rather to
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deplore the incurable inequality of his sides. Theoretically this doctrine is unquestionable, but
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it has practical drawbacks in dealing with an Isosceles. If a rascal pleads that
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he cannot help stealing because of his unevenness, you reply that for that very
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reason, because he cannot help being a nuisance to his neighbors, you the
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magistrate cannot help sentencing him to be consumed, And there's an end of the
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matter. But in little domestic difficulties, whether penalty of consumption or death is
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out of the question. This theory of configuration sometimes comes in awkwardly, and
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I must confess that occasionally when one of my own hexagonal grandsons pleads, as
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an excuse for his disobedience, that a sudden change of the temperature has been
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too much for his perimeter, and that I ought to lay the blame not
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on him, but on his configuration, which can only be strengthened by abundance
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of the choicest sweetmeats. I neither see my way logically to reject nor practically
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to accept his conclusions. For my own part, I find it best to
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assume that a good sound scolding or castigation has some latent and strengthening influence on
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my grandson's configuration. Though I own that I have no grounds for thinking so
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at all events, I am not alone in my way of extricating myself from
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this dilemma, For I find that many of the highest circles, sitting as
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judges in law courts, use praise and blame towards regular and irregular figures,
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and in their homes I know by experience that when scolding their children, they
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speak about right or wrong as vehemently and passionately, as if they believed that
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these names represented real existences, and that a human figure is really capable of
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choosing between them, Distantly carrying out their policy of making configuration the leading idea
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in every mind, the circles reverse the nature of that commandment which in Spaceland
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regulates the relations between parents and children. With you, children are taught to
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honor their parents with us, next to the circles, who are the chief
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object of universal homage. A man is taught to honor his grandson if he
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has one, or if not his son. By honor, however, is
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by no means meant indulgence, but a reverent regard for their highest interests.
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And the circles teach that the duty of fathers is to subordinate their own interests
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to those of posterity, thereby advancing the welfare of the whole state as well
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as that of their own immediate descendants. The weak point in the system of
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the circles, if a humah square may venture to speak of anything circular as
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containing any element of weakness, appears to me to be found in their relations
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with women. As it is of the utmost importance for society that irregular births
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should be discouraged, it follows that no woman who has any irregularities in her
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ancestry is a fit partner for one who desires that his posterity should rise by
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regular degrees in the social scale. Now, the irregularity of a male is
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a matter of measurement. But as all women are straight and therefore visibly regular,
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so to speak, one has to devise some other means of ascertaining what
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I may call their invisible irregularity, that is to say, their potential irregularities.
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As regards possible offspring. This is effected by carefully kept pedigrees, which
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are preserved and supervised by the state, and without assertainied pedigree, no woman
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is allowed to marry. Now, it might have been supposed that a circle,
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proud of his ancestry and regardful for a posterity which might possibly issue hereafter
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in a chief circle, would be more careful than any other to choose a
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wife who had no blot on her escutcheon. But it is not so.
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The care in choosing a regular wife appears to diminish as one rises in the
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social scale. Nothing would induce an aspiring Isosceles, who had hopes of generating
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an equilateral son, to take a wife who reckoned a single irregularity among her
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ancestors. A square or pentagon, who is confident that his family is steadily
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on the rise does not inquire above the five hundredth generation. A hexagon or
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dodecahedron is even more careless of the wife's pedigree. But a circle has been
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known deliberately to take a wife who has had an irregular great grandfather, and
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all because of some slight superiority of luster, or because of the charms of
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a low voice which with us, even more than with you, is thought
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an excellent thing in woman. Such ill judged marriages are as might be expected
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barren if they do not result in positive irregularity or in diminution of sides.
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But none of these evils have hitherto proved sufficiently deterrent. The loss of a
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few sides in a highly developed polygon is not easily noticed, and is sometimes
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compensated by a successful operation in the neo therapeutic gymnasium, as I have described
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above. And the circles are too much disposed to acquiesce in inficundity as a
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law of the superior development. Yet it is evil be not arrested. The
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gradual diminution of the circular class may soon become more rapid, and the time
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may not be far distant when the race, being no longer able to produce
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a chief circle, the constitution of flatland must fall. One other word of
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warnings suggests itself to me, though I cannot so easily mention a remedy.
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And this also refers to our relations with women. About three hundred years ago,
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it was decreed by the chief circle that, since women are deficient in
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reason, but abundant in emotion, they ought no longer to be treated as
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rational nor receive any mental education. The consequence was that they were no longer
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taught to read, nor even to master arithmetic enough to enable them to count
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the angles of their husband or children. And hence they sensibly declined during each
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generation in intellectual power. And this system of female non education or quietism,
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still prevails. My fear is that, with the best intentions, this policy
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has been carried so far as to react injuriously on the male sex. For
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the consequence is that, as things now are, we males have to lead
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a kind of bilingual and I may almost say by mental existence. With the
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women we speak of love, duty, right, wrong, pity, hope,
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and other irrational and emotional conceptions which have no existence, and the fiction
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of which has no object except to control feminine exuberances. But among ourselves and
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in our books, we have an entirely different vocabulary, and I may almost
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say idiom love then becomes the anticipation of benefits, duty becomes necessity or fitness,
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and other words are correspondingly transmuted. Moreover, among women, we use
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language implying the utmost deference for their sex, and they fully believe that the
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Chief circle himself is not more devoutly adored by us than they are. But
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behind their backs they are both regarded and spoken of by all except the very
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young, as being little better than mindless organisms. Our theology, also in
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the women's chambers, is entirely different from our theology elsewhere. Now, my
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humble fear is that this double training in language as well as in thought,
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imposes somewhat too heavy a burden upon the young, especially when, at the
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age of three years old they are taken from the maternal care and taught to
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unlearn the old language except for the purpose of repeating it in the presence of
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their mothers and nurses, and to learn the vocabulary and idiom of science.
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Already, methinks I discern a weakness in the grasp of mathematical truth at the
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present time, as compared with the more robust intellect of our ancestors three hundred
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years ago. I say nothing of the possible danger if a woman should ever
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surreptitiously learn to read and convey to her sex the result of her perusal of
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a single popular volume, nor of the possibility that the indiscretion or disobedience of
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some infant male might reveal to a mother the secrets of the logical dialect on
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the simple ground of the enfeebling of the male intellect. I rest this humble
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appeal to the highest authorities to reconsider the regulations of female education. End of
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Section twelve and of Post one