Flatland: A Romance of Many DimensionsAbbott, Edwin Abbott
Science
Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions
Abbott, Edwin Abbott
Fourth dimension
_I._ My Lord, your own wisdom has taught me to aspire to One even more
great, more beautiful, and more closely approximate to Perfection than
yourself. As you yourself, superior to all Flatland forms, combine many
Circles in One, so doubtless there is One above you who combines many
Spheres in One Supreme Existence, surpassing even the Solids of
Spaceland. And even as we, who are now in Space, look down on Flatland
and see the insides of all things, so of a certainty there is yet above
us some higher, purer region, whither thou dost surely purpose to lead
me—O Thou Whom I shall always call, everywhere and in all Dimensions, my
Priest, Philosopher, and Friend—some yet more spacious Space, some more
dimensionable Dimensionality, from the vantage-ground of which we shall
look down together upon the revealed insides of Solid things, and where
thine own intestines, and those of thy kindred Spheres, will lie exposed
to the view of the poor wandering exile from Flatland, to whom so much
has already been vouchsafed.
_Sphere._ Pooh! Stuff! Enough of this trifling! The time is short, and
much remains to be done before you are fit to proclaim the Gospel of
Three Dimensions to your blind benighted countrymen in Flatland.
_I._ Nay, gracious Teacher, deny me not what I know it is in thy power to
perform. Grant me but one glimpse of thine interior, and I am satisfied
for ever, remaining henceforth thy docile pupil, thy unemancipable slave,
ready to receive all thy teachings and to feed upon the words that fall
from thy lips.
_Sphere._ Well, then, to content and silence you, let me say at once, I
would show you what you wish if I could; but I cannot. Would you have me
turn my stomach inside out to oblige you?
_I._ But my Lord has shown me the intestines of all my countrymen in the
Land of Two Dimensions by taking me with him into the Land of Three. What
therefore more easy than now to take his servant on a second journey into
the blessed region of the Fourth Dimension, where I shall look down with
him once more upon this land of Three Dimensions, and see the inside of
every three-dimensioned house, the secrets of the solid earth, the
treasures of the mines in Spaceland, and the intestines of every solid
living creature, even of the noble and adorable Spheres.
_Sphere._ But where is this land of Four Dimensions?
_I._ I know not: but doubtless my Teacher knows.
_Sphere._ Not I. There is no such land. The very idea of it is utterly
inconceivable.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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