Anthem

PART ONE

It is a sin to write this. It is a sin to think words no others

think and to put them down upon a paper no others are to see. It

is base and evil. It is as if we were speaking alone to no ears

but our own. And we know well that there is no transgression

blacker than to do or think alone. We have broken the laws. The

laws say that men may not write unless the Council of Vocations

bid them so. May we be forgiven!

But this is not the only sin upon us. We have committed a greater

crime, and for this crime there is no name. What punishment

awaits us if it be discovered we know not, for no such crime has

come in the memory of men and there are no laws to provide for

it.

It is dark here. The flame of the candle stands still in the air.

Nothing moves in this tunnel save our hand on the paper. We are

alone here under the earth. It is a fearful word, alone. The laws

say that none among men may be alone, ever and at any time, for

this is the great transgression and the root of all evil. But we

have broken many laws. And now there is nothing here save our one

body, and it is strange to see only two legs stretched on the

ground, and on the wall before us the shadow of our one head.

The walls are cracked and water runs upon them in thin threads

without sound, black and glistening as blood. We stole the candle

from the larder of the Home of the Street Sweepers. We shall be

sentenced to ten years in the Palace of Corrective Detention if

it be discovered. But this matters not. It matters only that the

light is precious and we should not waste it to write when we

need it for that work which is our crime. Nothing matters save

the work, our secret, our evil, our precious work. Still, we must

also write, for—may the Council have mercy upon us!—we wish to

speak for once to no ears but our own.

Our name is Equality 7-2521, as it is written on the iron

bracelet which all men wear on their left wrists with their names

upon it. We are twenty-one years old. We are six feet tall, and

this is a burden, for there are not many men who are six feet

tall. Ever have the Teachers and the Leaders pointed to us and

frowned and said:

“There is evil in your bones, Equality 7-2521, for your body has

grown beyond the bodies of your brothers.” But we cannot change

our bones nor our body.

We were born with a curse. It has always driven us to thoughts

which are forbidden. It has always given us wishes which men may

not wish. We know that we are evil, but there is no will in us

and no power to resist it. This is our wonder and our secret

fear, that we know and do not resist.

We strive to be like all our brother men, for all men must be

alike. Over the portals of the Palace of the World Council, there

are words cut in the marble, which we repeat to ourselves

whenever we are tempted:

“WE ARE ONE IN ALL AND ALL IN ONE.

THERE ARE NO MEN BUT ONLY THE GREAT _WE_,

ONE, INDIVISIBLE AND FOREVER.”

We repeat this to ourselves, but it helps us not.

These words were cut long ago. There is green mould in the

grooves of the letters and yellow streaks on the marble, which

come from more years than men could count. And these words are

the truth, for they are written on the Palace of the World

Council, and the World Council is the body of all truth. Thus has

it been ever since the Great Rebirth, and farther back than that

no memory can reach.

But we must never speak of the times before the Great Rebirth,

else we are sentenced to three years in the Palace of Corrective

Detention. It is only the Old Ones who whisper about it in the

evenings, in the Home of the Useless. They whisper many strange

things, of the towers which rose to the sky, in those

Unmentionable Times, and of the wagons which moved without

horses, and of the lights which burned without flame. But those

times were evil. And those times passed away, when men saw the

Great Truth which is this: that all men are one and that there is

no will save the will of all men together.

All men are good and wise. It is only we, Equality 7-2521, we

alone who were born with a curse. For we are not like our

brothers. And as we look back upon our life, we see that it has

ever been thus and that it has brought us step by step to our

last, supreme transgression, our crime of crimes hidden here

under the ground.

We remember the Home of the Infants where we lived till we were

five years old, together with all the children of the City who

had been born in the same year. The sleeping halls there were

white and clean and bare of all things save one hundred beds. We

were just like all our brothers then, save for the one

transgression: we fought with our brothers. There are few

offenses blacker than to fight with our brothers, at any age and

for any cause whatsoever. The Council of the Home told us so, and

of all the children of that year, we were locked in the cellar

most often.

When we were five years old, we were sent to the Home of the

Students, where there are ten wards, for our ten years of

learning. Men must learn till they reach their fifteenth year.

Then they go to work. In the Home of the Students we arose when

the big bell rang in the tower and we went to our beds when it

rang again. Before we removed our garments, we stood in the great

sleeping hall, and we raised our right arms, and we said all

together with the three Teachers at the head:

“We are nothing. Mankind is all. By the grace of our brothers are

we allowed our lives. We exist through, by and for our brothers

who are the State. Amen.”

Then we slept. The sleeping halls were white and clean and bare

of all things save one hundred beds.

We, Equality 7-2521, were not happy in those years in the Home of

the Students. It was not that the learning was too hard for us.

It was that the learning was too easy. This is a great sin, to be

born with a head which is too quick. It is not good to be

different from our brothers, but it is evil to be superior to

them. The Teachers told us so, and they frowned when they looked

upon us.

So we fought against this curse. We tried to forget our lessons,

but we always remembered. We tried not to understand what the

Teachers taught, but we always understood it before the Teachers

had spoken. We looked upon Union 5-3992, who were a pale boy with

only half a brain, and we tried to say and do as they did, that

we might be like them, like Union 5-3992, but somehow the

Teachers knew that we were not. And we were lashed more often

than all the other children.

The Teachers were just, for they had been appointed by the

Councils, and the Councils are the voice of all justice, for they

are the voice of all men. And if sometimes, in the secret

darkness of our heart, we regret that which befell us on our

fifteenth birthday, we know that it was through our own guilt. We

had broken a law, for we had not paid heed to the words of our

Teachers. The Teachers had said to us all:

“Dare not choose in your minds the work you would like to do when

you leave the Home of the Students. You shall do that which the

Council of Vocations shall prescribe for you. For the Council of

Vocations knows in its great wisdom where you are needed by your

brother men, better than you can know it in your unworthy little

minds. And if you are not needed by your brother man, there is no

reason for you to burden the earth with your bodies.”

We knew this well, in the years of our childhood, but our curse

broke our will. We were guilty and we confess it here: we were

guilty of the great Transgression of Preference. We preferred

some work and some lessons to the others. We did not listen well

to the history of all the Councils elected since the Great

Rebirth. But we loved the Science of Things. We wished to know.

We wished to know about all the things which make the earth

around us. We asked so many questions that the Teachers forbade

it.

We think that there are mysteries in the sky and under the water

and in the plants which grow. But the Council of Scholars has

said that there are no mysteries, and the Council of Scholars

knows all things. And we learned much from our Teachers. We

learned that the earth is flat and that the sun revolves around

it, which causes the day and the night. We learned the names of

all the winds which blow over the seas and push the sails of our

great ships. We learned how to bleed men to cure them of all

ailments.

We loved the Science of Things. And in the darkness, in the

secret hour, when we awoke in the night and there were no

brothers around us, but only their shapes in the beds and their

snores, we closed our eyes, and we held our lips shut, and we

stopped our breath, that no shudder might let our brothers see or

hear or guess, and we thought that we wished to be sent to the

Home of the Scholars when our time would come.

All the great modern inventions come from the Home of the

Scholars, such as the newest one, which was found only a hundred

years ago, of how to make candles from wax and string; also, how

to make glass, which is put in our windows to protect us from the

rain. To find these things, the Scholars must study the earth and

learn from the rivers, from the sands, from the winds and the

rocks. And if we went to the Home of the Scholars, we could learn

from these also. We could ask questions of these, for they do not

forbid questions.

And questions give us no rest. We know not why our curse makes us

seek we know not what, ever and ever. But we cannot resist it. It

whispers to us that there are great things on this earth of ours,

and that we can know them if we try, and that we must know them.

We ask, why must we know, but it has no answer to give us. We

must know that we may know.

So we wished to be sent to the Home of the Scholars. We wished it

so much that our hands trembled under the blankets in the night,

and we bit our arm to stop that other pain which we could not

endure. It was evil and we dared not face our brothers in the

morning. For men may wish nothing for themselves. And we were

punished when the Council of Vocations came to give us our life

Mandates which tell those who reach their fifteenth year what

their work is to be for the rest of their days.

The Council of Vocations came on the first day of spring, and

they sat in the great hall. And we who were fifteen and all the

Teachers came into the great hall. And the Council of Vocations

sat on a high dais, and they had but two words to speak to each

of the Students. They called the Students’ names, and when the

Students stepped before them, one after another, the Council

said: “Carpenter” or “Doctor” or “Cook” or “Leader.” Then each

Student raised their right arm and said: “The will of our

brothers be done.”

Now if the Council has said “Carpenter” or “Cook,” the Students

so assigned go to work and they do not study any further. But if

the Council has said “Leader,” then those Students go into the

Home of the Leaders, which is the greatest house in the City, for

it has three stories. And there they study for many years, so

that they may become candidates and be elected to the City

Council and the State Council and the World Council—by a free and

general vote of all men. But we wished not to be a Leader, even

though it is a great honor. We wished to be a Scholar.

So we awaited our turn in the great hall and then we heard the

Council of Vocations call our name: “Equality 7-2521.” We walked

to the dais, and our legs did not tremble, and we looked up at

the Council. There were five members of the Council, three of the

male gender and two of the female. Their hair was white and their

faces were cracked as the clay of a dry river bed. They were old.

They seemed older than the marble of the Temple of the World

Council. They sat before us and they did not move. And we saw no

breath to stir the folds of their white togas. But we knew that

they were alive, for a finger of the hand of the oldest rose,

pointed to us, and fell down again. This was the only thing which

moved, for the lips of the oldest did not move as they said:

“Street Sweeper.”

We felt the cords of our neck grow tight as our head rose higher

to look upon the faces of the Council, and we were happy. We knew

we had been guilty, but now we had a way to atone for it. We

would accept our Life Mandate, and we would work for our

brothers, gladly and willingly, and we would erase our sin

against them, which they did not know, but we knew. So we were

happy, and proud of ourselves and of our victory over ourselves.

We raised our right arm and we spoke, and our voice was the

clearest, the steadiest voice in the hall that day, and we said:

“The will of our brothers be done.”

And we looked straight into the eyes of the Council, but their

eyes were as cold blue glass buttons.

So we went into the Home of the Street Sweepers. It is a grey

house on a narrow street. There is a sundial in its courtyard, by

which the Council of the Home can tell the hours of the day and

when to ring the bell. When the bell rings, we all arise from our

beds. The sky is green and cold in our windows to the east. The

shadow on the sundial marks off a half-hour while we dress and

eat our breakfast in the dining hall, where there are five long

tables with twenty clay plates and twenty clay cups on each

table. Then we go to work in the streets of the City, with our

brooms and our rakes. In five hours, when the sun is high, we

return to the Home and we eat our midday meal, for which one-half

hour is allowed. Then we go to work again. In five hours, the

shadows are blue on the pavements, and the sky is blue with a

deep brightness which is not bright. We come back to have our

dinner, which lasts one hour. Then the bell rings and we walk in

a straight column to one of the City Halls, for the Social

Meeting. Other columns of men arrive from the Homes of the

different Trades. The candles are lit, and the Councils of the

different Homes stand in a pulpit, and they speak to us of our

duties and of our brother men. Then visiting Leaders mount the

pulpit and they read to us the speeches which were made in the

City Council that day, for the City Council represents all men

and all men must know. Then we sing hymns, the Hymn of

Brotherhood, and the Hymn of Equality, and the Hymn of the

Collective Spirit. The sky is a soggy purple when we return to

the Home. Then the bell rings and we walk in a straight column to

the City Theatre for three hours of Social Recreation. There a

play is shown upon the stage, with two great choruses from the

Home of the Actors, which speak and answer all together, in two

great voices. The plays are about toil and how good it is. Then

we walk back to the Home in a straight column. The sky is like a

black sieve pierced by silver drops that tremble, ready to burst

through. The moths beat against the street lanterns. We go to our

beds and we sleep, till the bell rings again. The sleeping halls

are white and clean and bare of all things save one hundred beds.

Thus have we lived each day of four years, until two springs ago

when our crime happened. Thus must all men live until they are

forty. At forty, they are worn out. At forty, they are sent to

the Home of the Useless, where the Old Ones live. The Old Ones do

not work, for the State takes care of them. They sit in the sun

in summer and they sit by the fire in winter. They do not speak

often, for they are weary. The Old Ones know that they are soon

to die. When a miracle happens and some live to be forty-five,

they are the Ancient Ones, and the children stare at them when

passing by the Home of the Useless. Such is to be our life, as

that of all our brothers and of the brothers who came before us.

Such would have been our life, had we not committed our crime

which changed all things for us. And it was our curse which drove

us to our crime. We had been a good Street Sweeper and like all

our brother Street Sweepers, save for our cursed wish to know. We

looked too long at the stars at night, and at the trees and the

earth. And when we cleaned the yard of the Home of the Scholars,

we gathered the glass vials, the pieces of metal, the dried bones

which they had discarded. We wished to keep these things and to

study them, but we had no place to hide them. So we carried them

to the City Cesspool. And then we made the discovery.

It was on a day of the spring before last. We Street Sweepers

work in brigades of three, and we were with Union 5-3992, they of

the half-brain, and with International 4-8818. Now Union 5-3992

are a sickly lad and sometimes they are stricken with

convulsions, when their mouth froths and their eyes turn white.

But International 4-8818 are different. They are a tall, strong

youth and their eyes are like fireflies, for there is laughter in

their eyes. We cannot look upon International 4-8818 and not

smile in answer. For this they were not liked in the Home of the

Students, as it is not proper to smile without reason. And also

they were not liked because they took pieces of coal and they

drew pictures upon the walls, and they were pictures which made

men laugh. But it is only our brothers in the Home of the Artists

who are permitted to draw pictures, so International 4-8818 were

sent to the Home of the Street Sweepers, like ourselves.

International 4-8818 and we are friends. This is an evil thing to

say, for it is a transgression, the great Transgression of

Preference, to love any among men better than the others, since

we must love all men and all men are our friends. So

International 4-8818 and we have never spoken of it. But we know.

We know, when we look into each other’s eyes. And when we look

thus without words, we both know other things also, strange

things for which there are no words, and these things frighten

us.

So on that day of the spring before last, Union 5-3992 were

stricken with convulsions on the edge of the City, near the City

Theatre. We left them to lie in the shade of the Theatre tent and

we went with International 4-8818 to finish our work. We came

together to the great ravine behind the Theatre. It is empty save

for trees and weeds. Beyond the ravine there is a plain, and

beyond the plain there lies the Uncharted Forest, about which men

must not think.

We were gathering the papers and the rags which the wind had

blown from the Theatre, when we saw an iron bar among the weeds.

It was old and rusted by many rains. We pulled with all our

strength, but we could not move it. So we called International

4-8818, and together we scraped the earth around the bar. Of a

sudden the earth fell in before us, and we saw an old iron grill

over a black hole.

International 4-8818 stepped back. But we pulled at the grill and

it gave way. And then we saw iron rings as steps leading down a

shaft into a darkness without bottom.

“We shall go down,” we said to International 4-8818.

“It is forbidden,” they answered.

We said: “The Council does not know of this hole, so it cannot be

forbidden.”

And they answered: “Since the Council does not know of this hole,

there can be no law permitting to enter it. And everything which

is not permitted by law is forbidden.”

But we said: “We shall go, none the less.”

They were frightened, but they stood by and watched us go.

We hung on the iron rings with our hands and our feet. We could

see nothing below us. And above us the hole open upon the sky

grew smaller and smaller, till it came to be the size of a

button. But still we went down. Then our foot touched the ground.

We rubbed our eyes, for we could not see. Then our eyes became

used to the darkness, but we could not believe what we saw.

No men known to us could have built this place, nor the men known

to our brothers who lived before us, and yet it was built by men.

It was a great tunnel. Its walls were hard and smooth to the

touch; it felt like stone, but it was not stone. On the ground

there were long thin tracks of iron, but it was not iron; it felt

smooth and cold as glass. We knelt, and we crawled forward, our

hand groping along the iron line to see where it would lead. But

there was an unbroken night ahead. Only the iron tracks glowed

through it, straight and white, calling us to follow. But we

could not follow, for we were losing the puddle of light behind

us. So we turned and we crawled back, our hand on the iron line.

And our heart beat in our fingertips, without reason. And then we

knew.

We knew suddenly that this place was left from the Unmentionable

Times. So it was true, and those Times had been, and all the

wonders of those Times. Hundreds upon hundreds of years ago men

knew secrets which we have lost. And we thought: “This is a foul

place. They are damned who touch the things of the Unmentionable

Times.” But our hand which followed the track, as we crawled,

clung to the iron as if it would not leave it, as if the skin of

our hand were thirsty and begging of the metal some secret fluid

beating in its coldness.

We returned to the earth. International 4-8818 looked upon us and

stepped back.

“Equality 7-2521,” they said, “your face is white.”

But we could not speak and we stood looking upon them.

They backed away, as if they dared not touch us. Then they

smiled, but it was not a gay smile; it was lost and pleading. But

still we could not speak. Then they said:

“We shall report our find to the City Council and both of us will

be rewarded.”

And then we spoke. Our voice was hard and there was no mercy in

our voice. We said:

“We shall not report our find to the City Council. We shall not

report it to any men.”

They raised their hands to their ears, for never had they heard

such words as these.

“International 4-8818,” we asked, “will you report us to the

Council and see us lashed to death before your eyes?”

They stood straight all of a sudden and they answered: “Rather

would we die.”

“Then,” we said, “keep silent. This place is ours. This place

belongs to us, Equality 7-2521, and to no other men on earth. And

if ever we surrender it, we shall surrender our life with it

also.”

Then we saw that the eyes of International 4-8818 were full to

the lids with tears they dared not drop. They whispered, and

their voice trembled, so that their words lost all shape:

“The will of the Council is above all things, for it is the will

of our brothers, which is holy. But if you wish it so, we shall

obey you. Rather shall we be evil with you than good with all our

brothers. May the Council have mercy upon both our hearts!”

Then we walked away together and back to the Home of the Street

Sweepers. And we walked in silence.

Thus did it come to pass that each night, when the stars are high

and the Street Sweepers sit in the City Theatre, we, Equality

7-2521, steal out and run through the darkness to our place. It

is easy to leave the Theatre; when the candles are blown out and

the Actors come onto the stage, no eyes can see us as we crawl

under our seat and under the cloth of the tent. Later, it is easy

to steal through the shadows and fall in line next to

International 4-8818, as the column leaves the Theatre. It is

dark in the streets and there are no men about, for no men may

walk through the City when they have no mission to walk there.

Each night, we run to the ravine, and we remove the stones which

we have piled upon the iron grill to hide it from the men. Each

night, for three hours, we are under the earth, alone.

We have stolen candles from the Home of the Street Sweepers, we

have stolen flints and knives and paper, and we have brought them

to this place. We have stolen glass vials and powders and acids

from the Home of the Scholars. Now we sit in the tunnel for three

hours each night and we study. We melt strange metals, and we mix

acids, and we cut open the bodies of the animals which we find in

the City Cesspool. We have built an oven of the bricks we

gathered in the streets. We burn the wood we find in the ravine.

The fire flickers in the oven and blue shadows dance upon the

walls, and there is no sound of men to disturb us.

We have stolen manuscripts. This is a great offense. Manuscripts

are precious, for our brothers in the Home of the Clerks spend

one year to copy one single script in their clear handwriting.

Manuscripts are rare and they are kept in the Home of the

Scholars. So we sit under the earth and we read the stolen

scripts. Two years have passed since we found this place. And in

these two years we have learned more than we had learned in the

ten years of the Home of the Students.

We have learned things which are not in the scripts. We have

solved secrets of which the Scholars have no knowledge. We have

come to see how great is the unexplored, and many lifetimes will

not bring us to the end of our quest. But we wish no end to our

quest. We wish nothing, save to be alone and to learn, and to

feel as if with each day our sight were growing sharper than the

hawk’s and clearer than rock crystal.

Strange are the ways of evil. We are false in the faces of our

brothers. We are defying the will of our Councils. We alone, of

the thousands who walk this earth, we alone in this hour are

doing a work which has no purpose save that we wish to do it. The

evil of our crime is not for the human mind to probe. The nature

of our punishment, if it be discovered, is not for the human

heart to ponder. Never, not in the memory of the Ancient Ones’

Ancients, never have men done that which we are doing.

And yet there is no shame in us and no regret. We say to

ourselves that we are a wretch and a traitor. But we feel no

burden upon our spirit and no fear in our heart. And it seems to

us that our spirit is clear as a lake troubled by no eyes save

those of the sun. And in our heart—strange are the ways of

evil!—in our heart there is the first peace we have known in

twenty years.

PART TWO

Liberty 5-3000... Liberty five-three thousand ... Liberty

5-3000....

We wish to write this name. We wish to speak it, but we dare not

speak it above a whisper. For men are forbidden to take notice of

women, and women are forbidden to take notice of men. But we

think of one among women, they whose name is Liberty 5-3000, and

we think of no others. The women who have been assigned to work

the soil live in the Homes of the Peasants beyond the City. Where

the City ends there is a great road winding off to the north, and

we Street Sweepers must keep this road clean to the first

milepost. There is a hedge along the road, and beyond the hedge

lie the fields. The fields are black and ploughed, and they lie

like a great fan before us, with their furrows gathered in some

hand beyond the sky, spreading forth from that hand, opening wide

apart as they come toward us, like black pleats that sparkle with

thin, green spangles. Women work in the fields, and their white

tunics in the wind are like the wings of sea-gulls beating over

the black soil.

And there it was that we saw Liberty 5-3000 walking along the

furrows. Their body was straight and thin as a blade of iron.

Their eyes were dark and hard and glowing, with no fear in them,

no kindness and no guilt. Their hair was golden as the sun; their

hair flew in the wind, shining and wild, as if it defied men to

restrain it. They threw seeds from their hand as if they deigned

to fling a scornful gift, and the earth was a beggar under their

feet.

We stood still; for the first time did we know fear, and then

pain. And we stood still that we might not spill this pain more

precious than pleasure.

Then we heard a voice from the others call their name: “Liberty

5-3000,” and they turned and walked back. Thus we learned their

name, and we stood watching them go, till their white tunic was

lost in the blue mist.

And the following day, as we came to the northern road, we kept

our eyes upon Liberty 5-3000 in the field. And each day

thereafter we knew the illness of waiting for our hour on the

northern road. And there we looked at Liberty 5-3000 each day. We

know not whether they looked at us also, but we think they did.

Then one day they came close to the hedge, and suddenly they

turned to us. They turned in a whirl and the movement of their

body stopped, as if slashed off, as suddenly as it had started.

They stood still as a stone, and they looked straight upon us,

straight into our eyes. There was no smile on their face, and no

welcome. But their face was taut, and their eyes were dark. Then

they turned as swiftly, and they walked away from us.

But the following day, when we came to the road, they smiled.

They smiled to us and for us. And we smiled in answer. Their head

fell back, and their arms fell, as if their arms and their thin

white neck were stricken suddenly with a great lassitude. They

were not looking upon us, but upon the sky. Then they glanced at

us over their shoulder, as we felt as if a hand had touched our

body, slipping softly from our lips to our feet.

Every morning thereafter, we greeted each other with our eyes. We

dared not speak. It is a transgression to speak to men of other

Trades, save in groups at the Social Meetings. But once, standing

at the hedge, we raised our hand to our forehead and then moved

it slowly, palm down, toward Liberty 5-3000. Had the others seen

it, they could have guessed nothing, for it looked only as if we

were shading our eyes from the sun. But Liberty 5-3000 saw it and

understood. They raised their hand to their forehead and moved it

as we had. Thus, each day, we greet Liberty 5-3000, and they

answer, and no men can suspect.

We do not wonder at this new sin of ours. It is our second

Transgression of Preference, for we do not think of all our

brothers, as we must, but only of one, and their name is Liberty

5-3000. We do not know why we think of them. We do not know why,

when we think of them, we feel all of a sudden that the earth is

good and that it is not a burden to live. We do not think of them

as Liberty 5-3000 any longer. We have given them a name in our

thoughts. We call them the Golden One. But it is a sin to give

men names which distinguish them from other men. Yet we call them

the Golden One, for they are not like the others. The Golden One

are not like the others.

And we take no heed of the law which says that men may not think

of women, save at the Time of Mating. This is the time each

spring when all the men older than twenty and all the women older

than eighteen are sent for one night to the City Palace of

Mating. And each of the men have one of the women assigned to

them by the Council of Eugenics. Children are born each winter,

but women never see their children and children never know their

parents. Twice have we been sent to the Palace of Mating, but it

is an ugly and shameful matter, of which we do not like to think.

We had broken so many laws, and today we have broken one more.

Today, we spoke to the Golden One.

The other women were far off in the field, when we stopped at the

hedge by the side of the road. The Golden One were kneeling alone

at the moat which runs through the field. And the drops of water

falling from their hands, as they raised the water to their lips,

were like sparks of fire in the sun. Then the Golden One saw us,

and they did not move, kneeling there, looking at us, and circles

of light played upon their white tunic, from the sun on the water

of the moat, and one sparkling drop fell from a finger of their

hand held as frozen in the air.

Then the Golden One rose and walked to the hedge, as if they had

heard a command in our eyes. The two other Street Sweepers of our

brigade were a hundred paces away down the road. And we thought

that International 4-8818 would not betray us, and Union 5-3992

would not understand. So we looked straight upon the Golden One,

and we saw the shadows of their lashes on their white cheeks and

the sparks of sun on their lips. And we said:

“You are beautiful, Liberty 5-3000.”

Their face did not move and they did not avert their eyes. Only

their eyes grew wider, and there was triumph in their eyes, and

it was not triumph over us, but over things we could not guess.

Then they asked:

“What is your name?”

“Equality 7-2521,” we answered.

“You are not one of our brothers, Equality 7-2521, for we do not

wish you to be.”

We cannot say what they meant, for there are no words for their

meaning, but we know it without words and we knew it then.

“No,” we answered, “nor are you one of our sisters.”

“If you see us among scores of women, will you look upon us?”

“We shall look upon you, Liberty 5-3000, if we see you among all

the women of the earth.”

Then they asked:

“Are Street Sweepers sent to different parts of the City or do

they always work in the same places?”

“They always work in the same places,” we answered, “and no one

will take this road away from us.”

“Your eyes,” they said, “are not like the eyes of any among men.”

And suddenly, without cause for the thought which came to us, we

felt cold, cold to our stomach.

“How old are you?” we asked.

They understood our thought, for they lowered their eyes for the

first time.

“Seventeen,” they whispered.

And we sighed, as if a burden had been taken from us, for we had

been thinking without reason of the Palace of Mating. And we

thought that we would not let the Golden One be sent to the

Palace. How to prevent it, how to bar the will of the Councils,

we knew not, but we knew suddenly that we would. Only we do not

know why such thought came to us, for these ugly matters bear no

relation to us and the Golden One. What relation can they bear?

Still, without reason, as we stood there by the hedge, we felt

our lips drawn tight with hatred, a sudden hatred for all our

brother men. And the Golden One saw it and smiled slowly, and

there was in their smile the first sadness we had seen in them.

We think that in the wisdom of women the Golden One had

understood more than we can understand.

Then three of the sisters in the field appeared, coming toward

the road, so the Golden One walked away from us. They took the

bag of seeds, and they threw the seeds into the furrows of earth

as they walked away. But the seeds flew wildly, for the hand of

the Golden One was trembling.

Yet as we walked back to the Home of the Street Sweepers, we felt

that we wanted to sing, without reason. So we were reprimanded

tonight, in the dining hall, for without knowing it we had begun

to sing aloud some tune we had never heard. But it is not proper

to sing without reason, save at the Social Meetings.

“We are singing because we are happy,” we answered the one of the

Home Council who reprimanded us.

“Indeed you are happy,” they answered. “How else can men be when

they live for their brothers?”

And now, sitting here in our tunnel, we wonder about these words.

It is forbidden, not to be happy. For, as it has been explained

to us, men are free and the earth belongs to them; and all things

on earth belong to all men; and the will of all men together is

good for all; and so all men must be happy.

Yet as we stand at night in the great hall, removing our garments

for sleep, we look upon our brothers and we wonder. The heads of

our brothers are bowed. The eyes of our brothers are dull, and

never do they look one another in the eyes. The shoulders of our

brothers are hunched, and their muscles are drawn, as if their

bodies were shrinking and wished to shrink out of sight. And a

word steals into our mind, as we look upon our brothers, and that

word is fear.

There is fear hanging in the air of the sleeping halls, and in

the air of the streets. Fear walks through the City, fear without

name, without shape. All men feel it and none dare to speak.

We feel it also, when we are in the Home of the Street Sweepers.

But here, in our tunnel, we feel it no longer. The air is pure

under the ground. There is no odor of men. And these three hours

give us strength for our hours above the ground.

Our body is betraying us, for the Council of the Home looks with

suspicion upon us. It is not good to feel too much joy nor to be

glad that our body lives. For we matter not and it must not

matter to us whether we live or die, which is to be as our

brothers will it. But we, Equality 7-2521, are glad to be living.

If this is a vice, then we wish no virtue.

Yet our brothers are not like us. All is not well with our

brothers. There are Fraternity 2-5503, a quiet boy with wise,

kind eyes, who cry suddenly, without reason, in the midst of day

or night, and their body shakes with sobs they cannot explain.

There are Solidarity 9-6347, who are a bright youth, without fear

in the day; but they scream in their sleep, and they scream:

“Help us! Help us! Help us!” into the night, in a voice which

chills our bones, but the Doctors cannot cure Solidarity 9-6347.

And as we all undress at night, in the dim light of the candles,

our brothers are silent, for they dare not speak the thoughts of

their minds. For all must agree with all, and they cannot know if

their thoughts are the thoughts of all, and so they fear to

speak. And they are glad when the candles are blown for the

night. But we, Equality 7-2521, look through the window upon the

sky, and there is peace in the sky, and cleanliness, and dignity.

And beyond the City there lies the plain, and beyond the plain,

black upon the black sky, there lies the Uncharted Forest.

We do not wish to look upon the Uncharted Forest. We do not wish

to think of it. But ever do our eyes return to that black patch

upon the sky. Men never enter the Uncharted Forest, for there is

no power to explore it and no path to lead among its ancient

trees which stand as guards of fearful secrets. It is whispered

that once or twice in a hundred years, one among the men of the

City escape alone and run to the Uncharted Forest, without call

or reason. These men do not return. They perish from hunger and

from the claws of the wild beasts which roam the Forest. But our

Councils say that this is only a legend. We have heard that there

are many Uncharted Forests over the land, among the Cities. And

it is whispered that they have grown over the ruins of many

cities of the Unmentionable Times. The trees have swallowed the

ruins, and the bones under the ruins, and all the things which

perished. And as we look upon the Uncharted Forest far in the

night, we think of the secrets of the Unmentionable Times. And we

wonder how it came to pass that these secrets were lost to the

world. We have heard the legends of the great fighting, in which

many men fought on one side and only a few on the other. These

few were the Evil Ones and they were conquered. Then great fires

raged over the land. And in these fires the Evil Ones and all the

things made by the Evil Ones were burned. And the fire which is

called the Dawn of the Great Rebirth, was the Script Fire where

all the scripts of the Evil Ones were burned, and with them all

the words of the Evil Ones. Great mountains of flame stood in the

squares of the Cities for three months. Then came the Great

Rebirth.

The words of the Evil Ones... The words of the Unmentionable

Times... What are the words which we have lost?

May the Council have mercy upon us! We had no wish to write such

a question, and we knew not what we were doing till we had

written it. We shall not ask this question and we shall not think

it. We shall not call death upon our head.

And yet... And yet... There is some word, one single word which

is not in the language of men, but which had been. And this is

the Unspeakable Word, which no men may speak nor hear. But

sometimes, and it is rare, sometimes, somewhere, one among men

find that word. They find it upon scraps of old manuscripts or

cut into the fragments of ancient stones. But when they speak it

they are put to death. There is no crime punished by death in

this world, save this one crime of speaking the Unspeakable Word.

We have seen one of such men burned alive in the square of the

City. And it was a sight which has stayed with us through the

years, and it haunts us, and follows us, and it gives us no rest.

We were a child then, ten years old. And we stood in the great

square with all the children and all the men of the City, sent to

behold the burning. They brought the Transgressor out into the

square and they led them to the pyre. They had torn out the

tongue of the Transgressor, so that they could speak no longer.

The Transgressor were young and tall. They had hair of gold and

eyes blue as morning. They walked to the pyre, and their step did

not falter. And of all the faces on that square, of all the faces

which shrieked and screamed and spat curses upon them, theirs was

the calmest and the happiest face.

As the chains were wound over their body at the stake, and a

flame set to the pyre, the Transgressor looked upon the City.

There was a thin thread of blood running from the corner of their

mouth, but their lips were smiling. And a monstrous thought came

to us then, which has never left us. We had heard of Saints.

There are the Saints of Labor, and the Saints of the Councils,

and the Saints of the Great Rebirth. But we had never seen a

Saint nor what the likeness of a Saint should be. And we thought

then, standing in the square, that the likeness of a Saint was

the face we saw before us in the flames, the face of the

Transgressor of the Unspeakable Word.

As the flames rose, a thing happened which no eyes saw but ours,

else we would not be living today. Perhaps it had only seemed to

us. But it seemed to us that the eyes of the Transgressor had

chosen us from the crowd and were looking straight upon us. There

was no pain in their eyes and no knowledge of the agony of their

body. There was only joy in them, and pride, a pride holier than

is fit for human pride to be. And it seemed as if these eyes were

trying to tell us something through the flames, to send into our

eyes some word without sound. And it seemed as if these eyes were

begging us to gather that word and not to let it go from us and

from the earth. But the flames rose and we could not guess the

word....

What—even if we have to burn for it like the Saint of the

Pyre—what is the Unspeakable Word?

PART THREE

We, Equality 7-2521, have discovered a new power of nature. And

we have discovered it alone, and we alone are to know it.

It is said. Now let us be lashed for it, if we must. The Council

of Scholars has said that we all know the things which exist and

therefore the things which are not known by all do not exist. But

we think that the Council of Scholars is blind. The secrets of

this earth are not for all men to see, but only for those who

will seek them. We know, for we have found a secret unknown to

all our brothers.

We know not what this power is nor whence it comes. But we know

its nature, we have watched it and worked with it. We saw it

first two years ago. One night, we were cutting open the body of

a dead frog when we saw its leg jerking. It was dead, yet it

moved. Some power unknown to men was making it move. We could not

understand it. Then, after many tests, we found the answer. The

frog had been hanging on a wire of copper; and it had been the

metal of our knife which had sent the strange power to the copper

through the brine of the frog’s body. We put a piece of copper

and a piece of zinc into a jar of brine, we touched a wire to

them, and there, under our fingers, was a miracle which had never

occurred before, a new miracle and a new power.

This discovery haunted us. We followed it in preference to all

our studies. We worked with it, we tested it in more ways than we

can describe, and each step was as another miracle unveiling

before us. We came to know that we had found the greatest power

on earth. For it defies all the laws known to men. It makes the

needle move and turn on the compass which we stole from the Home

of the Scholars; but we had been taught, when still a child, that

the loadstone points to the north and that this is a law which

nothing can change; yet our new power defies all laws. We found

that it causes lightning, and never have men known what causes

lightning. In thunderstorms, we raised a tall rod of iron by the

side of our hole, and we watched it from below. We have seen the

lightning strike it again and again. And now we know that metal

draws the power of the sky, and that metal can be made to give it

forth.

We have built strange things with this discovery of ours. We used

for it the copper wires which we found here under the ground. We

have walked the length of our tunnel, with a candle lighting the

way. We could go no farther than half a mile, for earth and rock

had fallen at both ends. But we gathered all the things we found

and we brought them to our work place. We found strange boxes

with bars of metal inside, with many cords and strands and coils

of metal. We found wires that led to strange little globes of

glass on the walls; they contained threads of metal thinner than

a spider’s web.

These things help us in our work. We do not understand them, but

we think that the men of the Unmentionable Times had known our

power of the sky, and these things had some relation to it. We do

not know, but we shall learn. We cannot stop now, even though it

frightens us that we are alone in our knowledge.

No single one can possess greater wisdom than the many Scholars

who are elected by all men for their wisdom. Yet we can. We do.

We have fought against saying it, but now it is said. We do not

care. We forget all men, all laws and all things save our metals

and our wires. So much is still to be learned! So long a road

lies before us, and what care we if we must travel it alone!

PART FOUR

Many days passed before we could speak to the Golden One again.

But then came the day when the sky turned white, as if the sun

had burst and spread its flame in the air, and the fields lay

still without breath, and the dust of the road was white in the

glow. So the women of the field were weary, and they tarried over

their work, and they were far from the road when we came. But the

Golden One stood alone at the hedge, waiting. We stopped and we

saw that their eyes, so hard and scornful to the world, were

looking at us as if they would obey any word we might speak.

And we said:

“We have given you a name in our thoughts, Liberty 5-3000.”

“What is our name?” they asked.

“The Golden One.”

“Nor do we call you Equality 7-2521 when we think of you.”

“What name have you given us?” They looked straight into our eyes

and they held their head high and they answered:

“The Unconquered.”

For a long time we could not speak. Then we said:

“Such thoughts as these are forbidden, Golden One.”

“But you think such thoughts as these and you wish us to think

them.”

We looked into their eyes and we could not lie.

“Yes,” we whispered, and they smiled, and then we said: “Our

dearest one, do not obey us.”

They stepped back, and their eyes were wide and still.

“Speak these words again,” they whispered.

“Which words?” we asked. But they did not answer, and we knew it.

“Our dearest one,” we whispered.

Never have men said this to women.

The head of the Golden One bowed slowly, and they stood still

before us, their arms at their sides, the palms of their hands

turned to us, as if their body were delivered in submission to

our eyes. And we could not speak.

Then they raised their head, and they spoke simply and gently, as

if they wished us to forget some anxiety of their own.

“The day is hot,” they said, “and you have worked for many hours

and you must be weary.”

“No,” we answered.

“It is cooler in the fields,” they said, “and there is water to

drink. Are you thirsty?”

“Yes,” we answered, “but we cannot cross the hedge.”

“We shall bring the water to you,” they said.

Then they knelt by the moat, they gathered water in their two

hands, they rose and they held the water out to our lips.

We do not know if we drank that water. We only knew suddenly that

their hands were empty, but we were still holding our lips to

their hands, and that they knew it, but did not move.

We raised our head and stepped back. For we did not understand

what had made us do this, and we were afraid to understand it.

And the Golden One stepped back, and stood looking upon their

hands in wonder. Then the Golden One moved away, even though no

others were coming, and they moved, stepping back, as if they

could not turn from us, their arms bent before them, as if they

could not lower their hands.

PART FIVE

We made it. We created it. We brought it forth from the night of

the ages. We alone. Our hands. Our mind. Ours alone and only.

We know not what we are saying. Our head is reeling. We look upon

the light which we have made. We shall be forgiven for anything

we say tonight....

Tonight, after more days and trials than we can count, we

finished building a strange thing, from the remains of the

Unmentionable Times, a box of glass, devised to give forth the

power of the sky of greater strength than we had ever achieved

before. And when we put our wires to this box, when we closed the

current—the wire glowed! It came to life, it turned red, and a

circle of light lay on the stone before us.

We stood, and we held our head in our hands. We could not

conceive of that which we had created. We had touched no flint,

made no fire. Yet here was light, light that came from nowhere,

light from the heart of metal.

We blew out the candle. Darkness swallowed us. There was nothing

left around us, nothing save night and a thin thread of flame in

it, as a crack in the wall of a prison. We stretched our hands to

the wire, and we saw our fingers in the red glow. We could not

see our body nor feel it, and in that moment nothing existed save

our two hands over a wire glowing in a black abyss.

Then we thought of the meaning of that which lay before us. We

can light our tunnel, and the City, and all the Cities of the

world with nothing save metal and wires. We can give our brothers

a new light, cleaner and brighter than any they have ever known.

The power of the sky can be made to do men’s bidding. There are

no limits to its secrets and its might, and it can be made to

grant us anything if we but choose to ask.

Then we knew what we must do. Our discovery is too great for us

to waste our time in sweeping the streets. We must not keep our

secret to ourselves, nor buried under the ground. We must bring

it into the sight of all men. We need all our time, we need the

work rooms of the Home of the Scholars, we want the help of our

brother Scholars and their wisdom joined to ours. There is so

much work ahead for all of us, for all the Scholars of the world.

In a month, the World Council of Scholars is to meet in our City.

It is a great Council, to which the wisest of all lands are

elected, and it meets once a year in the different Cities of the

earth. We shall go to this Council and we shall lay before them,

as our gift, this glass box with the power of the sky. We shall

confess everything to them. They will see, understand and

forgive. For our gift is greater than our transgression. They

will explain it to the Council of Vocations, and we shall be

assigned to the Home of the Scholars. This has never been done

before, but neither has a gift such as ours ever been offered to

men.

We must wait. We must guard our tunnel as we had never guarded it

before. For should any men save the Scholars learn of our secret,

they would not understand it, nor would they believe us. They

would see nothing, save our crime of working alone, and they

would destroy us and our light. We care not about our body, but

our light is...

Yes, we do care. For the first time do we care about our body.

For this wire is as a part of our body, as a vein torn from us,

glowing with our blood. Are we proud of this thread of metal, or

of our hands which made it, or is there a line to divide these

two?

We stretch out our arms. For the first time do we know how strong

our arms are. And a strange thought comes to us: we wonder, for

the first time in our life, what we look like. Men never see

their own faces and never ask their brothers about it, for it is

evil to have concern for their own faces or bodies. But tonight,

for a reason we cannot fathom, we wish it were possible to us to

know the likeness of our own person.

PART SIX

We have not written for thirty days. For thirty days we have not

been here, in our tunnel. We had been caught. It happened on that

night when we wrote last. We forgot, that night, to watch the

sand in the glass which tells us when three hours have passed and

it is time to return to the City Theatre. When we remembered it,

the sand had run out.

We hastened to the Theatre. But the big tent stood grey and

silent against the sky. The streets of the City lay before us,

dark and empty. If we went back to hide in our tunnel, we would

be found and our light found with us. So we walked to the Home of

the Street Sweepers.

When the Council of the Home questioned us, we looked upon the

faces of the Council, but there was no curiosity in those faces,

and no anger, and no mercy. So when the oldest of them asked us:

“Where have you been?” we thought of our glass box and of our

light, and we forgot all else. And we answered:

“We will not tell you.”

The oldest did not question us further. They turned to the two

youngest, and said, and their voice was bored:

“Take our brother Equality 7-2521 to the Palace of Corrective

Detention. Lash them until they tell.”

So we were taken to the Stone Room under the Palace of Corrective

Detention. This room has no windows and it is empty save for an

iron post. Two men stood by the post, naked but for leather

aprons and leather hoods over their faces. Those who had brought

us departed, leaving us to the two Judges who stood in a corner

of the room. The Judges were small, thin men, grey and bent. They

gave the signal to the two strong hooded ones.

They tore the clothes from our body, they threw us down upon our

knees and they tied our hands to the iron post. The first blow of

the lash felt as if our spine had been cut in two. The second

blow stopped the first, and for a second we felt nothing, then

the pain struck us in our throat and fire ran in our lungs

without air. But we did not cry out.

The lash whistled like a singing wind. We tried to count the

blows, but we lost count. We knew that the blows were falling

upon our back. Only we felt nothing upon our back any longer. A

flaming grill kept dancing before our eyes, and we thought of

nothing save that grill, a grill, a grill of red squares, and

then we knew that we were looking at the squares of the iron

grill in the door, and there were also the squares of stone on

the walls, and the squares which the lash was cutting upon our

back, crossing and re-crossing itself in our flesh.

Then we saw a fist before us. It knocked our chin up, and we saw

the red froth of our mouth on the withered fingers, and the Judge

asked:

“Where have you been?”

But we jerked our head away, hid our face upon our tied hands,

and bit our lips.

The lash whistled again. We wondered who was sprinkling burning

coal dust upon the floor, for we saw drops of red twinkling on

the stones around us.

Then we knew nothing, save two voices snarling steadily, one

after the other, even though we knew they were speaking many

minutes apart:

“Where have you been where have you been where have you been

where have you been?...”

And our lips moved, but the sound trickled back into our throat,

and the sound was only:

“The light... The light... The light....”

Then we knew nothing.

We opened our eyes, lying on our stomach on the brick floor of a

cell. We looked upon two hands lying far before us on the bricks,

and we moved them, and we knew that they were our hands. But we

could not move our body. Then we smiled, for we thought of the

light and that we had not betrayed it.

We lay in our cell for many days. The door opened twice each day,

once for the men who brought us bread and water, and once for the

Judges. Many Judges came to our cell, first the humblest and then

the most honored Judges of the City. They stood before us in

their white togas, and they asked:

“Are you ready to speak?”

But we shook our head, lying before them on the floor. And they

departed.

We counted each day and each night as it passed. Then, tonight,

we knew that we must escape. For tomorrow the World Council of

Scholars is to meet in our City.

It was easy to escape from the Palace of Corrective Detention.

The locks are old on the doors and there are no guards about.

There is no reason to have guards, for men have never defied the

Councils so far as to escape from whatever place they were

ordered to be. Our body is healthy and strength returns to it

speedily. We lunged against the door and it gave way. We stole

through the dark passages, and through the dark streets, and down

into our tunnel.

We lit the candle and we saw that our place had not been found

and nothing had been touched. And our glass box stood before us

on the cold oven, as we had left it. What matter they now, the

scars upon our back!

Tomorrow, in the full light of day, we shall take our box, and

leave our tunnel open, and walk through the streets to the Home

of the Scholars. We shall put before them the greatest gift ever

offered to men. We shall tell them the truth. We shall hand to

them, as our confession, these pages we have written. We shall

join our hands to theirs, and we shall work together, with the

power of the sky, for the glory of mankind. Our blessing upon

you, our brothers! Tomorrow, you will take us back into your fold

and we shall be an outcast no longer. Tomorrow we shall be one of

you again. Tomorrow...

PART SEVEN

It is dark here in the forest. The leaves rustle over our head,

black against the last gold of the sky. The moss is soft and

warm. We shall sleep on this moss for many nights, till the

beasts of the forest come to tear our body. We have no bed now,

save the moss, and no future, save the beasts.

We are old now, yet we were young this morning, when we carried

our glass box through the streets of the City to the Home of the

Scholars. No men stopped us, for there were none about from the

Palace of Corrective Detention, and the others knew nothing. No

men stopped us at the gate. We walked through empty passages and

into the great hall where the World Council of Scholars sat in

solemn meeting.

We saw nothing as we entered, save the sky in the great windows,

blue and glowing. Then we saw the Scholars who sat around a long

table; they were as shapeless clouds huddled at the rise of the

great sky. There were men whose famous names we knew, and others

from distant lands whose names we had not heard. We saw a great

painting on the wall over their heads, of the twenty illustrious

men who had invented the candle.

All the heads of the Council turned to us as we entered. These

great and wise of the earth did not know what to think of us, and

they looked upon us with wonder and curiosity, as if we were a

miracle. It is true that our tunic was torn and stained with

brown stains which had been blood. We raised our right arm and we

said:

“Our greeting to you, our honored brothers of the World Council

of Scholars!”

Then Collective 0-0009, the oldest and wisest of the Council,

spoke and asked:

“Who are you, our brother? For you do not look like a Scholar.”

“Our name is Equality 7-2521,” we answered, “and we are a Street

Sweeper of this City.”

Then it was as if a great wind had stricken the hall, for all the

Scholars spoke at once, and they were angry and frightened.

“A Street Sweeper! A Street Sweeper walking in upon the World

Council of Scholars! It is not to be believed! It is against all

the rules and all the laws!”

But we knew how to stop them.

“Our brothers!” we said. “We matter not, nor our transgression.

It is only our brother men who matter. Give no thought to us, for

we are nothing, but listen to our words, for we bring you a gift

such as had never been brought to men. Listen to us, for we hold

the future of mankind in our hands.”

Then they listened.

We placed our glass box upon the table before them. We spoke of

it, and of our long quest, and of our tunnel, and of our escape

from the Palace of Corrective Detention. Not a hand moved in that

hall, as we spoke, nor an eye. Then we put the wires to the box,

and they all bent forward and sat still, watching. And we stood

still, our eyes upon the wire. And slowly, slowly as a flush of

blood, a red flame trembled in the wire. Then the wire glowed.

But terror struck the men of the Council. They leapt to their

feet, they ran from the table, and they stood pressed against the

wall, huddled together, seeking the warmth of one another’s

bodies to give them courage.

We looked upon them and we laughed and said:

“Fear nothing, our brothers. There is a great power in these

wires, but this power is tamed. It is yours. We give it to you.”

Still they would not move.

“We give you the power of the sky!” we cried. “We give you the

key to the earth! Take it, and let us be one of you, the humblest

among you. Let us all work together, and harness this power, and

make it ease the toil of men. Let us throw away our candles and

our torches. Let us flood our cities with light. Let us bring a

new light to men!”

But they looked upon us, and suddenly we were afraid. For their

eyes were still, and small, and evil.

“Our brothers!” we cried. “Have you nothing to say to us?”

Then Collective 0-0009 moved forward. They moved to the table and

the others followed.

“Yes,” spoke Collective 0-0009, “we have much to say to you.”

The sound of their voices brought silence to the hall and to beat

of our heart.

“Yes,” said Collective 0-0009, “we have much to say to a wretch

who have broken all the laws and who boast of their infamy!

“How dared you think that your mind held greater wisdom than the

minds of your brothers? And if the Councils had decreed that you

should be a Street Sweeper, how dared you think that you could be

of greater use to men than in sweeping the streets?”

“How dared you, gutter cleaner,” spoke Fraternity 9-3452, “to

hold yourself as one alone and with the thoughts of the one and

not of the many?”

“You shall be burned at the stake,” said Democracy 4-6998.

“No, they shall be lashed,” said Unanimity 7-3304, “till there is

nothing left under the lashes.”

“No,” said Collective 0-0009, “we cannot decide upon this, our

brothers. No such crime has ever been committed, and it is not

for us to judge. Nor for any small Council. We shall deliver this

creature to the World Council itself and let their will be done.”

We looked upon them and we pleaded:

“Our brothers! You are right. Let the will of the Council be done

upon our body. We do not care. But the light? What will you do

with the light?”

Collective 0-0009 looked upon us, and they smiled.

“So you think that you have found a new power,” said Collective

0-0009. “Do all your brothers think that?”

“No,” we answered.

“What is not thought by all men cannot be true,” said Collective

0-0009.

“You have worked on this alone?” asked International 1-5537.

“Many men in the Homes of the Scholars have had strange new ideas

in the past,” said Solidarity 8-1164, “but when the majority of

their brother Scholars voted against them, they abandoned their

ideas, as all men must.”

“This box is useless,” said Alliance 6-7349.

“Should it be what they claim of it,” said Harmony 9-2642, “then

it would bring ruin to the Department of Candles. The Candle is a

great boon to mankind, as approved by all men. Therefore it

cannot be destroyed by the whim of one.”

“This would wreck the Plans of the World Council,” said Unanimity

2-9913, “and without the Plans of the World Council the sun

cannot rise. It took fifty years to secure the approval of all

the Councils for the Candle, and to decide upon the number

needed, and to re-fit the Plans so as to make candles instead of

torches. This touched upon thousands and thousands of men working

in scores of States. We cannot alter the Plans again so soon.”

“And if this should lighten the toil of men,” said Similarity

5-0306, “then it is a great evil, for men have no cause to exist

save in toiling for other men.”

Then Collective 0-0009 rose and pointed at our box.

“This thing,” they said, “must be destroyed.”

And all the others cried as one:

“It must be destroyed!”

Then we leapt to the table.

We seized our box, we shoved them aside, and we ran to the

window. We turned and we looked at them for the last time, and a

rage, such as it is not fit for humans to know, choked our voice

in our throat.

“You fools!” we cried. “You fools! You thrice-damned fools!”

We swung our fist through the windowpane, and we leapt out in a

ringing rain of glass.

We fell, but we never let the box fall from our hands. Then we

ran. We ran blindly, and men and houses streaked past us in a

torrent without shape. And the road seemed not to be flat before

us, but as if it were leaping up to meet us, and we waited for

the earth to rise and strike us in the face. But we ran. We knew

not where we were going. We knew only that we must run, run to

the end of the world, to the end of our days.

Then we knew suddenly that we were lying on a soft earth and that

we had stopped. Trees taller than we had ever seen before stood

over us in great silence. Then we knew. We were in the Uncharted

Forest. We had not thought of coming here, but our legs had

carried our wisdom, and our legs had brought us to the Uncharted

Forest against our will.

Our glass box lay beside us. We crawled to it, we fell upon it,

our face in our arms, and we lay still.

We lay thus for a long time. Then we rose, we took our box and

walked on into the forest.

It mattered not where we went. We knew that men would not follow

us, for they never enter the Uncharted Forest. We had nothing to

fear from them. The forest disposes of its own victims. This gave

us no fear either. Only we wished to be away, away from the City

and from the air that touches upon the air of the City. So we

walked on, our box in our arms, our heart empty.

We are doomed. Whatever days are left to us, we shall spend them

alone. And we have heard of the corruption to be found in

solitude. We have torn ourselves from the truth which is our

brother men, and there is no road back for us, and no redemption.

We know these things, but we do not care. We care for nothing on

earth. We are tired.

Only the glass box in our arms is like a living heart that gives

us strength. We have lied to ourselves. We have not built this

box for the good of our brothers. We built it for its own sake.

It is above all our brothers to us, and its truth above their

truth. Why wonder about this? We have not many days to live. We

are walking to the fangs awaiting us somewhere among the great,

silent trees. There is not a thing behind us to regret.

Then a blow of pain struck us, our first and our only. We thought

of the Golden One. We thought of the Golden One whom we shall

never see again. Then the pain passed. It is best. We are one of

the Damned. It is best if the Golden One forget our name and the

body which bore that name.

PART EIGHT

It has been a day of wonder, this, our first day in the forest.

We awoke when a ray of sunlight fell across our face. We wanted

to leap to our feet, as we have had to leap every morning of our

life, but we remembered suddenly that no bell had rung and that

there was no bell to ring anywhere. We lay on our back, we threw

our arms out, and we looked up at the sky. The leaves had edges

of silver that trembled and rippled like a river of green and

fire flowing high above us.

We did not wish to move. We thought suddenly that we could lie

thus as long as we wished, and we laughed aloud at the thought.

We could also rise, or run, or leap, or fall down again. We were

thinking that these were thoughts without sense, but before we

knew it our body had risen in one leap. Our arms stretched out of

their own will, and our body whirled and whirled, till it raised

a wind to rustle through the leaves of the bushes. Then our hands

seized a branch and swung us high into a tree, with no aim save

the wonder of learning the strength of our body. The branch

snapped under us and we fell upon the moss that was soft as a

cushion. Then our body, losing all sense, rolled over and over on

the moss, dry leaves in our tunic, in our hair, in our face. And

we heard suddenly that we were laughing, laughing aloud, laughing

as if there were no power left in us save laughter.

Then we took our glass box, and we went on into the forest. We

went on, cutting through the branches, and it was as if we were

swimming through a sea of leaves, with the bushes as waves rising

and falling and rising around us, and flinging their green sprays

high to the treetops. The trees parted before us, calling us

forward. The forest seemed to welcome us. We went on, without

thought, without care, with nothing to feel save the song of our

body.

We stopped when we felt hunger. We saw birds in the tree

branches, and flying from under our footsteps. We picked a stone

and we sent it as an arrow at a bird. It fell before us. We made

a fire, we cooked the bird, and we ate it, and no meal had ever

tasted better to us. And we thought suddenly that there was a

great satisfaction to be found in the food which we need and

obtain by our own hand. And we wished to be hungry again and

soon, that we might know again this strange new pride in eating.

Then we walked on. And we came to a stream which lay as a streak

of glass among the trees. It lay so still that we saw no water

but only a cut in the earth, in which the trees grew down,

upturned, and the sky lay at the bottom. We knelt by the stream

and we bent down to drink. And then we stopped. For, upon the

blue of the sky below us, we saw our own face for the first time.

We sat still and we held our breath. For our face and our body

were beautiful. Our face was not like the faces of our brothers,

for we felt not pity when looking upon it. Our body was not like

the bodies of our brothers, for our limbs were straight and thin

and hard and strong. And we thought that we could trust this

being who looked upon us from the stream, and that we had nothing

to fear with this being.

We walked on till the sun had set. When the shadows gathered

among the trees, we stopped in a hollow between the roots, where

we shall sleep tonight. And suddenly, for the first time this

day, we remembered that we are the Damned. We remembered it, and

we laughed.

We are writing this on the paper we had hidden in our tunic

together with the written pages we had brought for the World

Council of Scholars, but never given to them. We have much to

speak of to ourselves, and we hope we shall find the words for it

in the days to come. Now, we cannot speak, for we cannot

understand.

PART NINE

We have not written for many days. We did not wish to speak. For

we needed no words to remember that which has happened to us.

It was on our second day in the forest that we heard steps behind

us. We hid in the bushes, and we waited. The steps came closer.

And then we saw the fold of a white tunic among the trees, and a

gleam of gold.

We leapt forward, we ran to them, and we stood looking upon the

Golden One.

They saw us, and their hands closed into fists, and the fists

pulled their arms down, as if they wished their arms to hold

them, while their body swayed. And they could not speak.

We dared not come too close to them. We asked, and our voice

trembled:

“How did you come to be here, Golden One?”

But they whispered only:

“We have found you....”

“How did you come to be in the forest?” we asked.

They raised their head, and there was a great pride in their

voice; they answered:

“We have followed you.”

Then we could not speak, and they said:

“We heard that you had gone to the Uncharted Forest, for the

whole City is speaking of it. So on the night of the day when we

heard it, we ran away from the Home of the Peasants. We found the

marks of your feet across the plain where no men walk. So we

followed them, and we went into the forest, and we followed the

path where the branches were broken by your body.”

Their white tunic was torn, and the branches had cut the skin of

their arms, but they spoke as if they had never taken notice of

it, nor of weariness, nor of fear.

“We have followed you,” they said, “and we shall follow you

wherever you go. If danger threatens you, we shall face it also.

If it be death, we shall die with you. You are damned, and we

wish to share your damnation.”

They looked upon us, and their voice was low, but there was

bitterness and triumph in their voice.

“Your eyes are as a flame, but our brothers have neither hope nor

fire. Your mouth is cut of granite, but our brothers are soft and

humble. Your head is high, but our brothers cringe. You walk, but

our brothers crawl. We wish to be damned with you, rather than

blessed with all our brothers. Do as you please with us, but do

not send us away from you.”

Then they knelt, and bowed their golden head before us.

We had never thought of that which we did. We bent to raise the

Golden One to their feet, but when we touched them, it was as if

madness had stricken us. We seized their body and we pressed our

lips to theirs. The Golden One breathed once, and their breath

was a moan, and then their arms closed around us.

We stood together for a long time. And we were frightened that we

had lived for twenty-one years and had never known what joy is

possible to men.

Then we said:

“Our dearest one. Fear nothing of the forest. There is no danger

in solitude. We have no need of our brothers. Let us forget their

good and our evil, let us forget all things save that we are

together and that there is joy as a bond between us. Give us your

hand. Look ahead. It is our own world, Golden One, a strange,

unknown world, but our own.”

Then we walked on into the forest, their hand in ours.

And that night we knew that to hold the body of women in our arms

is neither ugly nor shameful, but the one ecstasy granted to the

race of men.

We have walked for many days. The forest has no end, and we seek

no end. But each day added to the chain of days between us and

the City is like an added blessing.

We have made a bow and many arrows. We can kill more birds than

we need for our food; we find water and fruit in the forest. At

night, we choose a clearing, and we build a ring of fires around

it. We sleep in the midst of that ring, and the beasts dare not

attack us. We can see their eyes, green and yellow as coals,

watching us from the tree branches beyond. The fires smoulder as

a crown of jewels around us, and smoke stands still in the air,

in columns made blue by the moonlight. We sleep together in the

midst of the ring, the arms of the Golden One around us, their

head upon our breast.

Some day, we shall stop and build a house, when we shall have

gone far enough. But we do not have to hasten. The days before us

are without end, like the forest.

We cannot understand this new life which we have found, yet it

seems so clear and so simple. When questions come to puzzle us,

we walk faster, then turn and forget all things as we watch the

Golden One following. The shadows of leaves fall upon their arms,

as they spread the branches apart, but their shoulders are in the

sun. The skin of their arms is like a blue mist, but their

shoulders are white and glowing, as if the light fell not from

above, but rose from under their skin. We watch the leaf which

has fallen upon their shoulder, and it lies at the curve of their

neck, and a drop of dew glistens upon it like a jewel. They

approach us, and they stop, laughing, knowing what we think, and

they wait obediently, without questions, till it pleases us to

turn and go on.

We go on and we bless the earth under our feet. But questions

come to us again, as we walk in silence. If that which we have

found is the corruption of solitude, then what can men wish for

save corruption? If this is the great evil of being alone, then

what is good and what is evil?

Everything which comes from the many is good. Everything which

comes from one is evil. This have we been taught with our first

breath. We have broken the law, but we have never doubted it. Yet

now, as we walk through the forest, we are learning to doubt.

There is no life for men, save in useful toil for the good of all

their brothers. But we lived not, when we toiled for our

brothers, we were only weary. There is no joy for men, save the

joy shared with all their brothers. But the only things which

taught us joy were the power we created in our wires, and the

Golden One. And both these joys belong to us alone, they come

from us alone, they bear no relation to all our brothers, and

they do not concern our brothers in any way. Thus do we wonder.

There is some error, one frightful error, in the thinking of men.

What is that error? We do not know, but the knowledge struggles

within us, struggles to be born. Today, the Golden One stopped

suddenly and said:

“We love you.”

But they frowned and shook their head and looked at us

helplessly.

“No,” they whispered, “that is not what we wished to say.”

They were silent, then they spoke slowly, and their words were

halting, like the words of a child learning to speak for the

first time:

“We are one... alone... and only... and we love you who are

one... alone... and only.”

We looked into each other’s eyes and we knew that the breath of a

miracle had touched us, and fled, and left us groping vainly.

And we felt torn, torn for some word we could not find.

PART TEN

We are sitting at a table and we are writing this upon paper made

thousands of years ago. The light is dim, and we cannot see the

Golden One, only one lock of gold on the pillow of an ancient

bed. This is our home.

We came upon it today, at sunrise. For many days we had been

crossing a chain of mountains. The forest rose among cliffs, and

whenever we walked out upon a barren stretch of rock we saw great

peaks before us in the west, and to the north of us, and to the

south, as far as our eyes could see. The peaks were red and

brown, with the green streaks of forests as veins upon them, with

blue mists as veils over their heads. We had never heard of these

mountains, nor seen them marked on any map. The Uncharted Forest

has protected them from the Cities and from the men of the

Cities.

We climbed paths where the wild goat dared not follow. Stones

rolled from under our feet, and we heard them striking the rocks

below, farther and farther down, and the mountains rang with each

stroke, and long after the strokes had died. But we went on, for

we knew that no men would ever follow our track nor reach us

here.

Then today, at sunrise, we saw a white flame among the trees,

high on a sheer peak before us. We thought that it was a fire and

stopped. But the flame was unmoving, yet blinding as liquid

metal. So we climbed toward it through the rocks. And there,

before us, on a broad summit, with the mountains rising behind

it, stood a house such as we had never seen, and the white fire

came from the sun on the glass of its windows.

The house had two stories and a strange roof flat as a floor.

There was more window than wall upon its walls, and the windows

went on straight around the corners, though how this kept the

house standing we could not guess. The walls were hard and

smooth, of that stone unlike stone which we had seen in our

tunnel.

We both knew it without words: this house was left from the

Unmentionable Times. The trees had protected it from time and

weather, and from men who have less pity than time and weather.

We turned to the Golden One and we asked:

“Are you afraid?”

But they shook their head. So we walked to the door, and we threw

it open, and we stepped together into the house of the

Unmentionable Times.

We shall need the days and the years ahead, to look, to learn,

and to understand the things of this house. Today, we could only

look and try to believe the sight of our eyes. We pulled the

heavy curtains from the windows and we saw that the rooms were

small, and we thought that not more than twelve men could have

lived here. We thought it strange that men had been permitted to

build a house for only twelve.

Never had we seen rooms so full of light. The sunrays danced upon

colors, colors, more colors than we thought possible, we who had

seen no houses save the white ones, the brown ones and the grey.

There were great pieces of glass on the walls, but it was not

glass, for when we looked upon it we saw our own bodies and all

the things behind us, as on the face of a lake. There were

strange things which we had never seen and the use of which we do

not know. And there were globes of glass everywhere, in each

room, the globes with the metal cobwebs inside, such as we had

seen in our tunnel.

We found the sleeping hall and we stood in awe upon its

threshold. For it was a small room and there were only two beds

in it. We found no other beds in the house, and then we knew that

only two had lived here, and this passes understanding. What kind

of world did they have, the men of the Unmentionable Times?

We found garments, and the Golden One gasped at the sight of

them. For they were not white tunics, nor white togas; they were

of all colors, no two of them alike. Some crumbled to dust as we

touched them. But others were of heavier cloth, and they felt

soft and new in our fingers.

We found a room with walls made of shelves, which held rows of

manuscripts, from the floor to the ceiling. Never had we seen

such a number of them, nor of such strange shape. They were not

soft and rolled, they had hard shells of cloth and leather; and

the letters on their pages were so small and so even that we

wondered at the men who had such handwriting. We glanced through

the pages, and we saw that they were written in our language, but

we found many words which we could not understand. Tomorrow, we

shall begin to read these scripts.

When we had seen all the rooms of the house, we looked at the

Golden One and we both knew the thought in our minds.

“We shall never leave this house,” we said, “nor let it be taken

from us. This is our home and the end of our journey. This is

your house, Golden One, and ours, and it belongs to no other men

whatever as far as the earth may stretch. We shall not share it

with others, as we share not our joy with them, nor our love, nor

our hunger. So be it to the end of our days.”

“Your will be done,” they said.

Then we went out to gather wood for the great hearth of our home.

We brought water from the stream which runs among the trees under

our windows. We killed a mountain goat, and we brought its flesh

to be cooked in a strange copper pot we found in a place of

wonders, which must have been the cooking room of the house.

We did this work alone, for no words of ours could take the

Golden One away from the big glass which is not glass. They stood

before it and they looked and looked upon their own body.

When the sun sank beyond the mountains, the Golden One fell

asleep on the floor, amidst jewels, and bottles of crystal, and

flowers of silk. We lifted the Golden One in our arms and we

carried them to a bed, their head falling softly upon our

shoulder. Then we lit a candle, and we brought paper from the

room of the manuscripts, and we sat by the window, for we knew

that we could not sleep tonight.

And now we look upon the earth and sky. This spread of naked rock

and peaks and moonlight is like a world ready to be born, a world

that waits. It seems to us it asks a sign from us, a spark, a

first commandment. We cannot know what word we are to give, nor

what great deed this earth expects to witness. We know it waits.

It seems to say it has great gifts to lay before us, but it

wishes a greater gift for us. We are to speak. We are to give its

goal, its highest meaning to all this glowing space of rock and

sky.

We look ahead, we beg our heart for guidance in answering this

call no voice has spoken, yet we have heard. We look upon our

hands. We see the dust of centuries, the dust which hid the great

secrets and perhaps great evils. And yet it stirs no fear within

our heart, but only silent reverence and pity.

May knowledge come to us! What is the secret our heart has

understood and yet will not reveal to us, although it seems to

beat as if it were endeavoring to tell it?

PART ELEVEN

I am. I think. I will.

My hands... My spirit... My sky... My forest... This earth of

mine.... What must I say besides? These are the words. This is

the answer.

I stand here on the summit of the mountain. I lift my head and I

spread my arms. This, my body and spirit, this is the end of the

quest. I wished to know the meaning of things. I am the meaning.

I wished to find a warrant for being. I need no warrant for

being, and no word of sanction upon my being. I am the warrant

and the sanction.

It is my eyes which see, and the sight of my eyes grants beauty

to the earth. It is my ears which hear, and the hearing of my

ears gives its song to the world. It is my mind which thinks, and

the judgement of my mind is the only searchlight that can find

the truth. It is my will which chooses, and the choice of my will

is the only edict I must respect.

Many words have been granted me, and some are wise, and some are

false, but only three are holy: “I will it!”

Whatever road I take, the guiding star is within me; the guiding

star and the loadstone which point the way. They point in but one

direction. They point to me.

I know not if this earth on which I stand is the core of the

universe or if it is but a speck of dust lost in eternity. I know

not and I care not. For I know what happiness is possible to me

on earth. And my happiness needs no higher aim to vindicate it.

My happiness is not the means to any end. It is the end. It is

its own goal. It is its own purpose.

Neither am I the means to any end others may wish to accomplish.

I am not a tool for their use. I am not a servant of their needs.

I am not a bandage for their wounds. I am not a sacrifice on

their altars.

I am a man. This miracle of me is mine to own and keep, and mine

to guard, and mine to use, and mine to kneel before!

I do not surrender my treasures, nor do I share them. The fortune

of my spirit is not to be blown into coins of brass and flung to

the winds as alms for the poor of the spirit. I guard my

treasures: my thought, my will, my freedom. And the greatest of

these is freedom.

I owe nothing to my brothers, nor do I gather debts from them. I

ask none to live for me, nor do I live for any others. I covet no

man’s soul, nor is my soul theirs to covet.

I am neither foe nor friend to my brothers, but such as each of

them shall deserve of me. And to earn my love, my brothers must

do more than to have been born. I do not grant my love without

reason, nor to any chance passer-by who may wish to claim it. I

honor men with my love. But honor is a thing to be earned.

I shall choose friends among men, but neither slaves nor masters.

And I shall choose only such as please me, and them I shall love

and respect, but neither command nor obey. And we shall join our

hands when we wish, or walk alone when we so desire. For in the

temple of his spirit, each man is alone. Let each man keep his

temple untouched and undefiled. Then let him join hands with

others if he wishes, but only beyond his holy threshold.

For the word “We” must never be spoken, save by one’s choice and

as a second thought. This word must never be placed first within

man’s soul, else it becomes a monster, the root of all the evils

on earth, the root of man’s torture by men, and of an unspeakable

lie.

The word “We” is as lime poured over men, which sets and hardens

to stone, and crushes all beneath it, and that which is white and

that which is black are lost equally in the grey of it. It is the

word by which the depraved steal the virtue of the good, by which

the weak steal the might of the strong, by which the fools steal

the wisdom of the sages.

What is my joy if all hands, even the unclean, can reach into it?

What is my wisdom, if even the fools can dictate to me? What is

my freedom, if all creatures, even the botched and the impotent,

are my masters? What is my life, if I am but to bow, to agree and

to obey?

But I am done with this creed of corruption.

I am done with the monster of “We,” the word of serfdom, of

plunder, of misery, falsehood and shame.

And now I see the face of god, and I raise this god over the

earth, this god whom men have sought since men came into being,

this god who will grant them joy and peace and pride.

This god, this one word:

“I.”

PART TWELVE

It was when I read the first of the books I found in my house

that I saw the word “I.” And when I understood this word, the

book fell from my hands, and I wept, I who had never known tears.

I wept in deliverance and in pity for all mankind.

I understood the blessed thing which I had called my curse. I

understood why the best in me had been my sins and my

transgressions; and why I had never felt guilt in my sins. I

understood that centuries of chains and lashes will not kill the

spirit of man nor the sense of truth within him.

I read many books for many days. Then I called the Golden One,

and I told her what I had read and what I had learned. She looked

at me and the first words she spoke were:

“I love you.”

Then I said:

“My dearest one, it is not proper for men to be without names.

There was a time when each man had a name of his own to

distinguish him from all other men. So let us choose our names. I

have read of a man who lived many thousands of years ago, and of

all the names in these books, his is the one I wish to bear. He

took the light of the gods and he brought it to men, and he

taught men to be gods. And he suffered for his deed as all

bearers of light must suffer. His name was Prometheus.”

“It shall be your name,” said the Golden One.

“And I have read of a goddess,” I said, “who was the mother of

the earth and of all the gods. Her name was Gaea. Let this be

your name, my Golden One, for you are to be the mother of a new

kind of gods.”

“It shall be my name,” said the Golden One.

Now I look ahead. My future is clear before me. The Saint of the

pyre had seen the future when he chose me as his heir, as the

heir of all the saints and all the martyrs who came before him

and who died for the same cause, for the same word, no matter

what name they gave to their cause and their truth.

I shall live here, in my own house. I shall take my food from the

earth by the toil of my own hands. I shall learn many secrets

from my books. Through the years ahead, I shall rebuild the

achievements of the past, and open the way to carry them further,

the achievements which are open to me, but closed forever to my

brothers, for their minds are shackled to the weakest and dullest

ones among them.

I have learned that my power of the sky was known to men long

ago; they called it Electricity. It was the power that moved

their greatest inventions. It lit this house with light which

came from those globes of glass on the walls. I have found the

engine which produced this light. I shall learn how to repair it

and how to make it work again. I shall learn how to use the wires

which carry this power. Then I shall build a barrier of wires

around my home, and across the paths which lead to my home; a

barrier light as a cobweb, more impassable than a wall of

granite; a barrier my brothers will never be able to cross. For

they have nothing to fight me with, save the brute force of their

numbers. I have my mind.

Then here, on this mountaintop, with the world below me and

nothing above me but the sun, I shall live my own truth. Gaea is

pregnant with my child. Our son will be raised as a man. He will

be taught to say “I” and to bear the pride of it. He will be

taught to walk straight and on his own feet. He will be taught

reverence for his own spirit.

When I shall have read all the books and learned my new way, when

my home will be ready and my earth tilled, I shall steal one day,

for the last time, into the cursed City of my birth. I shall call

to me my friend who has no name save International 4-8818, and

all those like him, Fraternity 2-5503, who cries without reason,

and Solidarity 9-6347 who calls for help in the night, and a few

others. I shall call to me all the men and the women whose spirit

has not been killed within them and who suffer under the yoke of

their brothers. They will follow me and I shall lead them to my

fortress. And here, in this uncharted wilderness, I and they, my

chosen friends, my fellow-builders, shall write the first chapter

in the new history of man.

These are the things before me. And as I stand here at the door

of glory, I look behind me for the last time. I look upon the

history of men, which I have learned from the books, and I

wonder. It was a long story, and the spirit which moved it was

the spirit of man’s freedom. But what is freedom? Freedom from

what? There is nothing to take a man’s freedom away from him,

save other men. To be free, a man must be free of his brothers.

That is freedom. That and nothing else.

At first, man was enslaved by the gods. But he broke their

chains. Then he was enslaved by the kings. But he broke their

chains. He was enslaved by his birth, by his kin, by his race.

But he broke their chains. He declared to all his brothers that a

man has rights which neither god nor king nor other men can take

away from him, no matter what their number, for his is the right

of man, and there is no right on earth above this right. And he

stood on the threshold of the freedom for which the blood of the

centuries behind him had been spilled.

But then he gave up all he had won, and fell lower than his

savage beginning.

What brought it to pass? What disaster took their reason away

from men? What whip lashed them to their knees in shame and

submission? The worship of the word “We.”

When men accepted that worship, the structure of centuries

collapsed about them, the structure whose every beam had come

from the thought of some one man, each in his day down the ages,

from the depth of some one spirit, such spirit as existed but for

its own sake. Those men who survived those eager to obey, eager

to live for one another, since they had nothing else to vindicate

them—those men could neither carry on, nor preserve what they had

received. Thus did all thought, all science, all wisdom perish on

earth. Thus did men—men with nothing to offer save their great

number—lost the steel towers, the flying ships, the power wires,

all the things they had not created and could never keep.

Perhaps, later, some men had been born with the mind and the

courage to recover these things which were lost; perhaps these

men came before the Councils of Scholars. They were answered as I

have been answered—and for the same reasons.

But I still wonder how it was possible, in those graceless years

of transition, long ago, that men did not see whither they were

going, and went on, in blindness and cowardice, to their fate. I

wonder, for it is hard for me to conceive how men who knew the

word “I” could give it up and not know what they lost. But such

has been the story, for I have lived in the City of the damned,

and I know what horror men permitted to be brought upon them.

Perhaps, in those days, there were a few among men, a few of

clear sight and clean soul, who refused to surrender that word.

What agony must have been theirs before that which they saw

coming and could not stop! Perhaps they cried out in protest and

in warning. But men paid no heed to their warning. And they,

these few, fought a hopeless battle, and they perished with their

banners smeared by their own blood. And they chose to perish, for

they knew. To them, I send my salute across the centuries, and my

pity.

Theirs is the banner in my hand. And I wish I had the power to

tell them that the despair of their hearts was not to be final,

and their night was not without hope. For the battle they lost

can never be lost. For that which they died to save can never

perish. Through all the darkness, through all the shame of which

men are capable, the spirit of man will remain alive on this

earth. It may sleep, but it will awaken. It may wear chains, but

it will break through. And man will go on. Man, not men.

Here on this mountain, I and my sons and my chosen friends shall

build our new land and our fort. And it will become as the heart

of the earth, lost and hidden at first, but beating, beating

louder each day. And word of it will reach every corner of the

earth. And the roads of the world will become as veins which will

carry the best of the world’s blood to my threshold. And all my

brothers, and the Councils of my brothers, will hear of it, but

they will be impotent against me. And the day will come when I

shall break all the chains of the earth, and raze the cities of

the enslaved, and my home will become the capital of a world

where each man will be free to exist for his own sake.

For the coming of that day shall I fight, I and my sons and my

chosen friends. For the freedom of Man. For his rights. For his

life. For his honor.

And here, over the portals of my fort, I shall cut in the stone

the word which is to be my beacon and my banner. The word which

will not die, should we all perish in battle. The word which can

never die on this earth, for it is the heart of it and the

meaning and the glory.

The sacred word:

EGO