Section 18. How I came to Spaceland, and what I saw there
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An unspeakable, horrifying sensation gripped me. There was darkness, and then a dizzy, sickening version of “sight” that wasn’t like any sight I knew. I saw a Line that wasn’t a Line, I saw Space that wasn’t Space. I was myself, but I wasn’t myself anymore.
I closed my eye to make it stop, and when I finally found my voice, I shrieked in agony, “This is either insanity or Hell!”
“It’s neither,” the voice of the Sphere replied calmly, “It is knowledge, it is the Three Dimensions. Calm down, open your eye, and try looking again.”
I opened my eye again, and looked, and saw a new world!
There in front of me, in a way I’d never seen it before, was everything that I’d ever inferred, guessed, and dreamed of, in perfect Circular beauty.
I could see the entirety of the Stranger, right in front of me. What I would have called his inside was now visible to me, but I couldn’t see his heart, lungs, arteries, or anything else – only a beautiful otherworldly Something that I had no name for, but which you, my Readers in Spaceland, would call the surface of the Sphere.
I did the Flatland equivalent of what Spacelanders would call “bowing down”, or “getting on my knees” in front of my Teacher, and cried, “Please tell me, O Most Perfectly Wise and Beautiful One, why I can see your inside, but not your heart, lungs, arteries, or liver?”
“You are not actually seeing my inside,” he replied with a bit of annoyance; “Neither you, nor anyone else, can see my insides, because I am of a higher order than the Beings of Flatland. If I were just a Circle, you would be able to see my insides just as easily as I can see yours, but I am not just a Circle. I am many Circles, the Many in the One, which we call a Sphere. Just like the outer surfaces of a Cube are Squares, my surface appears as a Circle.”
Though I had no idea what he was saying, I had stopped being annoyed by that, and now felt only adoring worship for him.
He continued in a more gentle tone, “Don’t be too upset if you can’t immediately understand all of the mysteries of Spaceland, you’ll get the hang of it as we go. For now, come with me back to the Plane of Flatland, and I’ll show you everything you thought you were familiar with through math and imagination, but from a new angle that will let you actually See it all – from above!”
“That’s impossible!” I cried, but the Sphere was already leading the way, and I followed, as easily as if this were a dream.
“Look down there,” He said, “And see your own Pentagonal house, and everyone in it.”
I looked, and I saw with my own eye all the details of my house that I’d known existed through the sense of Feeling, and inferring from angles...but had never really seen.
And how pitiful was the way I’d imagined it all before, in comparison to the beautiful reality I now saw in front of me!
My four Sons were calmly sleeping in their North-Western Rooms, my two Grandsons to the South, the Servants, the Butler, my Daughter, all in their own apartments.
The little serving boy, the Page, had left his room, too, and, pretending to think that I’d fainted somewhere, was trying to break into the locked cabinet in my studyroom.
Only my Wife, alarmed by my sudden shouting and just as abrupt disappearance, had left her room and was actually looking for me, pacing up and down the Hall, clearly anxious for me to come back.
I could see all of this, with my real eye, not just in my imagination! And as we got closer and closer, I could see even more details – including what was inside my cabinet – the two chests of gold, and the one book that the Sphere hadn’t removed.
[Image description start: A black and white diagram showing the pentagon shaped house described above, with a compass in one corner showing the house points north. In the main room of the house is the straight line labled, “My wife”, while everyone else is asleep in their own rooms, except for the Page, who is in the study. Image description end.]
Not wanting to see my Wife so upset, I would have jumped back down to reassure her, but when I tried to move to do just that, I found myself stuck in place.
“Don’t worry about your Wife,” my Teacher said, “She’ll only be worried for a little while. For now, let’s look at Flatland some more.”
Once again I felt myself being grabbed and lifted through space, and the result was exactly what the Sphere had said it would be: the further away we were from what we were looking at, the more we could see at once.
My home city, with the inside of every single building and creature inside it, lay before me in miniature. Then we went even higher, and the secrets of the Earth, the depths of mines, caverns, and hills, were revealed to me.
Awestruck by the idea that the secrets of the earth itself were being revealed to me, a simple Square, I said to my Companion, “I have become a God! The wise men in my country have always said that to see all things, which they call Omnividence, is a power only a God can have!”
There was something like scorn in my Teacher’s voice as he answered me with, “Oh, is that so? Then the most criminal thieves and murderers from my country should be worshiped by your ‘wise men’ as Gods, because each of them can see as much as you do right now. But trust me, your ‘wise men’ are wrong.”
Me: Then, is Omnividence a power also given to those who aren’t Gods?
Sphere: I don’t know, but if a thief or a murder from my country can see everything in your country, obviously that’s not a good enough reason to accept them as a God. This ‘Omnividence’, as you call it, does it make you more upstanding, more merciful, less selfish, more loving? It doesn’t. So how does it make you more divine?”
Me: More merciful and loving?! These are the traits of Women! And we know that a Circle is a better Being than a Straight Line, we know that knowledge and wisdom are more important than ‘love’.
Sphere: It’s not my job to to tell you one type of person is better than another. But many of the best and brightest in Spaceland think that kindness and love are more important than knowledge. They are more like the Straight Lines you despise than the Circles you worship. But enough of this, look over there. Do you recognize that building?
I looked, and far off I saw an immense Polygonal building, which I recognized as the General Assembly Hall of the States of Flatland, surrounded by rows of Pentagonal buildings with streets cutting through them at right angles. We were going to the Great City, the Metropolis.
“We will go down again here,” my Teacher said when we arrived. It was now morning, the first hour of the first day of the year 2000.
Strictly sticking to tradition, the highest Circles of the world were holding an important and serious assembly, just like their ancestors had on the first day of the year 1000, and before that on the year 0.
The decisions of those earlier meetings were now being read to the council by a man I immediately recognized as my Brother, a perfectly Symmetrical Square, who was the Chief Scribe of the High Council.
He read the summary of the first meetings aloud:
“Because of the history of troublemakers and riots forming on this holiday from liars who pretend to have met visitors from another World, it has been unanimously decided that on the first day of each new thousandth year, special orders will be given to the Leaders of every country in Flatland to start a search for any of these liars and heretics.
“If found, there will be no excuses made for them, and no measurements will be taken. The punishment for this crime will depend on the criminal's shape: Any Isosceles will be killed at once. Any Equilateral Triangle will be whipped and imprisoned. Any Square or Pentagon will be sent to the district's Insane Asylum. Anyone of higher rank will be arrested and brought to the Capital immediately to be interviewed and judged by this Council.
“Do you all agree with this ruling?"
“That is your fate,” the Sphere said to me, while the Council was agreeing to pass the law for the third time, “Death or imprisonment are what await the Speaker of the Truth of Three Dimensions.”
“Not necessarily,” I said, “It seems so clear to me that I think I could even make a child understand it now. Just let me go down there, and I’ll explain it to them.”
“Not yet,” my Teacher said, “Your turn will come later. For now, I have to do my part. Wait here.”
With these words, he leapt agilely down into the sea (as it appeared from above) of Flatland, and landed right in the middle of the ring of Council members.
“I am here,” He shouted, “To tell you that there is a land of Three Dimensions!”
I watched many of the younger Counsellors jump away in obvious horror as the Sphere’s circular section seemed to expand in front of them. But the President Circle of the council didn’t seem surprised or afraid at all, and simply gave a signal that summoned six very low ranking Isosceles from different corners of the room, who immediately rushed upon the Sphere.
“We have him!” one cried, then another said, “No,” then, “Yes, we have him!” then, “No! He’s going – he’s gone!” as my Teacher lifted himself back out of Flatland.
“My Lords,” Said the President to the younger and lower ranked Circles of the Council, “Do not be alarmed. The Secret Archives that only I have access to tell me that the same kind of thing has happened during the starts of the last two Millenium as well. Obviously, don’t say anything about this to anyone outside this Council.”
Then he raised his voice and summoned the Presidential guards. “Arrest the Isosceles and gag them.” He said, “You know your duty.”
The Isosceles had been unlucky enough to witness a State Secret that they couldn’t be allowed to reveal, so they would be killed to keep them quiet. After they were led away, the President spoke to the Counselors again:
“My Lords, our meeting here is over, so the only thing I have left to do is to wish you a happy New Year.”
The others left the room, but before the President left, he told the Scribe, my perfectly Configured but unlucky Brother, how sorry he was, but he was going to have to spend the rest of his life in prison.
But, the President assured him cheerfully, as long as he promised to keep the secret, he wouldn’t be killed.
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