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Anthem by Ayn Rand
Chapter 1
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.
End of chapter 1.
Chapter 2
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?
End of chapter 2.
Chapter 3
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!
End of chapter 3.
Chapter 4
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.
End of chapter 4.
Chapter 5
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.
End of chapter 5.
Chapter 6
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...
End of chapter 6.
Chapter 7
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.
End of chapter 7.
Chapter 8
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.
End of chapter 8.
Chapter 9
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.
End of chapter 9.
Chapter 10
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?
End of chapter 10.
Chapter 11
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."
End of chapter 11.
Chapter 12
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
End of chapter 12.
End of Anthem by Ayn Rand.
Reading by Chere Theriot.
