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03 - Anthem - Ayn Rand · Science Fiction Books

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  Speaker 1: Chapter three. We equality seven two five two one have
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  Speaker 1: discovered a new power of nature, and we have discovered
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  Speaker 1: it alone, and we are to know it. It is said,
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  Speaker 1: now let us be lashed for it, if we must.
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  Speaker 1: The Council of Scholars has said that we all know
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  Speaker 1: the things which exist, and therefore all the things which
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  Speaker 1: are not known by all do not exist. But we
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  Speaker 1: think that the Council of Scholars is blind. The secrets
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  Speaker 1: of this earth are not for all men to see,
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  Speaker 1: but only for those who will seek them. We know,
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  Speaker 1: for we have found a secret unknown to all our brothers.
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  Speaker 1: We know not what this power is, nor whence it comes,
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  Speaker 1: but we know it is nature. We have watched it
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  Speaker 1: and worked with it. We saw it first two years ago.
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  Speaker 1: One night we were cutting open the body of a
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  Speaker 1: dead fraud when we saw its leg jerking. It was dead,
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  Speaker 1: yet it moved. Some power unknown to men was making
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  Speaker 1: it move. We could not understand it. Then, after many tests,
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  Speaker 1: we found the answer. The frog had been hanging on
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  Speaker 1: a wire of copper, and it had been the metal
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  Speaker 1: of our knife which had sent a strange power to
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  Speaker 1: the copper through the brine of the FOG's body. We
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  Speaker 1: put a piece of copper and a piece of zinc
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  Speaker 1: into a jar of brine. We touched a wire to them,
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  Speaker 1: and there under our fingers was a miracle which had
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  Speaker 1: never occurred before, a new miracle and a new power.
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  Speaker 1: This discovery haunted us. We followed it in preference to
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  Speaker 1: all our studies. We worked with it, We tested it
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  Speaker 1: in more ways than we can describe, and each step
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  Speaker 1: was another miracle unveiling before us. We came to know
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  Speaker 1: that we had found the greatest power on earth, for
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  Speaker 1: it defies all the laws known to men. It makes
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  Speaker 1: the needle move and turn on the compass, which we
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  Speaker 1: stole from the house of scholars. But we had been taught,
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  Speaker 1: when still a child, that the load stone points to
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  Speaker 1: the north, and this is a law which nothing can change.
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  Speaker 1: Yet our new power defies all laws. We found that
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  Speaker 1: it causes lightning, and never have men known what causes
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  Speaker 1: lightning in thunder storms. We raised a tall rod of
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  Speaker 1: iron by the side of our hole and watched it
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  Speaker 1: from below. We have seen the lightning strike it again
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  Speaker 1: and again. And now we know that metal draws the
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  Speaker 1: power of the sky, and that metal can be made
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  Speaker 1: to give it. Forth, we have built strange things with
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  Speaker 1: this discovery of ours, we used it for the copper
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  Speaker 1: wires which we found here under the ground. We have
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  Speaker 1: walk the length of our tunnel with a candle lighting
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  Speaker 1: the way. We could go no further than a half
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  Speaker 1: a mile, for earth and rock had fallen at both ends.
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  Speaker 1: But we gathered all the things we found, and we
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  Speaker 1: brought them to our workplace. We found strange boxes with
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  Speaker 1: bars of metal inside, with many cords and strands and
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  Speaker 1: coils of metal. We found wires that led to strange
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  Speaker 1: little globes of glass on the walls. They contained threads
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  Speaker 1: of metal thinner than a spider's web. These things help
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  Speaker 1: us in our work. We do not understand them, but
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  Speaker 1: we think that the men of the unmentionable times had
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  Speaker 1: known our power of the sky, and these things had
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  Speaker 1: some relation to it. We do not know, but we
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  Speaker 1: shall learn. We cannot stop now, even though it frightens
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  Speaker 1: us that we are alone in our knowledge. No single
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  Speaker 1: one can possess greater wisdom than the many scholars who
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  Speaker 1: are elected by all men for the wisdom. Yet we can,
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  Speaker 1: we do. We have fought against saying it, but now
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  Speaker 1: it is said. We do not care. We forget all men,
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  Speaker 1: all laws, and all things save our metals and our wires.
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  Speaker 1: So much is still to be learned. So long a
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  Speaker 1: road lies before us, And what care we if we
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  Speaker 1: must travel it alone? End of Chapter three