Passages from the Life of a Philosopher

chasm in it, into which some of them tumbled, and were with difficulty extricated:—in fact, they reported that it was only necessary to send proper persons to fill up this chasm in order to restore the universe to health. {413} 〈WELL FED AND WELL PAID ON RETURN.〉 Great rejoicings were made on the return of this Commission. Public meetings were held, speeches were made, papers were read, and medals were lavished. Those who had interest used their services on this committee to justify their promotion, each in his own different line. Those who had no interest as well as those who had, were anointed daily during twelve months with what I can but very imperfectly describe by calling it lip-salve. All this while they were fed at the public expense with royal food, which was highly coveted; but as far as I could make out, its taste must have been somewhat intermediate between rancid butter and flummery. Whatever this may have been, they relished it highly, and in truth it seems to have been well suited to their organs of digestion. Time, however, went on; the pestilence increased. Strange reports arose: first, that space itself was decaying; then, that there existed somewhere in decayed space an immense dragon whose breath produced the pestilence, and who swallowed up thousands of Spirits at each mouthful. Another Commission was sent, with in­struc­tions to fill up the hole in space. This was supposed to be a great step in advance. Having penetrated a very short distance beyond the celebrated chasm, they found another just like it, and on the same level. They found the first chasm slightly curved, which had indeed been remarked by an unpretending member of the former Commission: but so simple a remark was not thought worth reporting. The second chasm also was found slightly curved, but its curvature was in an opposite direction, presenting rudely the appearance of two parentheses, thus ( ). Upon this discovery the Commission were inclined to return and report that a series of chasms occurred in advance of the first, and that it would be useless—indeed, {414} that it would be highly dangerous—to open more chasms. One of the most modest of the Com­mis­sion­ers, who had been snubbed on the former occasion, suggested, however, that these slightly-curved chasms might possibly be portions of some vast circular crack: an idea which was ridiculed as a wild hypothesis by the chairman, quizzed by the secretary, and laughed at by all the rest. Fortunately they were persuaded to excavate a few yards more on the second vertical chasm or crack, when it became probable that the single dissentient was right. It soon became certain, and before half the circle had been uncovered, each member of the commission thought he had himself been the first to discover its circular shape. 〈THE MODEL CHAIRMAN.〉 But the chairman was a person of large experience. He quietly left the Com­mis­sion­ers to fight amongst themselves about the discovery of the circle, and if they chose, even about its quadrature. On his return, however, he reported that from some very extensive calculations of his own he had anticipated an elliptic cavity; that he had directed the attention of the Com­mis­sion­ers to the subject; and that they had succeeded in verifying his prediction. He also stated that the same theory led him to the knowledge of the fact, that in certain cases the ellipse might approach very nearly to a circle, although it could never actually reach it, whilst on the other hand it might become so flat as to approach a straight line—an approximation to which nobody ever suggested that the chairman himself could have attained. The chairman then, with singular modesty, alluding in his report to one of his colleagues possessing high rank, great influence and a very moderate knowledge of science, remarked that it was fortunate for him (the chairman) that that distinguished member had been so fully occupied with much more valuable {415} investigations, otherwise he would certainly have anticipated the important discovery it had fallen to his own lot to make. 〈THE COMMISSIONERS OUT-MANŒUVRED.〉 In the meantime the Com­mis­sion­ers, who had each wished to appropriate to himself the discovery of the circle, now thought that this usurpation of it by their chairman was most unjust towards the unpretending member who had really made it. They therefore advised him to claim his own discovery, and promised to back him in asserting it. But their chairman really was a clever fellow,56 and deep as Silurian rocks. Aware of the importance of the discovery thus appropriated, he had already visited the modest Com­mis­sion­er—had overwhelmed him with compliments, and had also prevailed upon that other influential Com­mis­sion­er whom he had so well buttered in his Report, to give him a small piece of preferment, which had been accepted by his victim:—thus putting a padlock upon his lips, which his brother Com­mis­sion­ers were unable either to unlock or to pick. 56 A clever fellow may oc­ca­sion­al­ly snatch our applause; but a clever man can alone command our respect. After the Report was presented, more speeches were made—more medals given, but the plague con­tin­ued, and their un­i­verse was de­pop­u­la­ted. A third Commission was afterwards sent, who reported that they found at the spot previously reached, on either side, two vast circles, the diameter of each of which was one hundred times the height of an ordinary individual; that the material occupying space within the circle differed slightly from that without it; and that it appeared as if a vast cylinder of space had been pushed through without disturbing the matter external to it. They also reported that the former Com­mis­sion­ers had never approached the origin of the mischief, but had simply worked their way, at right angles, to a {416} line which might terminate in it at the distance of a thousand miles, more or less, either on the right or on the left hand of the point they had reached. 〈DISTURBED VISION.〉 At this moment a sound like the roll of distant thunder recalled me to this lower world, and interrupted my interesting communion with the world of Spirits. That noise arose from the chimes of the cathedral clock. Spending a few days at Salisbury, I had wandered into the cathedral, and being much fatigued, had selected the luxurious pew of the Dean as a place of temporary rest. Reposing on elastic cushions, with my head resting on an eider-down pillow, the vision I have related had taken place. On removing the pillow I observed a small piece of matter beneath it. This, upon examination, turned out to be a morsel of decayed Gloucester cheese. The whole vision was now very clearly explained. The verger had evidently retired to the most commodious pew to eat his dinner, and had inadvertently left the small bit of cheese upon the very spot I had selected for my temporary repose. It was clear that my Spirit had been put, en rapport, with the soul of a mite, one of the most cultivated of his race. If the reader will glance over the following brief explanation, he will be fully convinced that my solution of this vision is the true one. Parallel Passages in the Creation of the Universe and in the Birth and Education of a Gloucester Cheese. References. a. Milk gushing into the milk-pail at the rate of twenty gushes per minute. Alternations of greater and less heat. b. Rennet being thrown in, the milk curdles. c. Curds compressed into cheese. {417} d. Cheese turned over daily during 121 days. A few minutes’ difference in the time of the dairyman’s attendance to perform this operation made the days slightly unequal. e. Cheese lifted up and pitched into a cart. f. Cheese jolted in cart during half a day on its way to to be shipped at Gloucester. g. Cheese pitched from cart into ship. h. Ship sails with the cheese for Southampton. i. The motion of the waves makes the mites sea-sick for three days. Multitudes die. j. Cheese taken from ship and pitched into a cart; as in the period e. k. Cheese conveyed in cart to cheesemonger at Salisbury—the mites dreadfully jolted, l. Cheese pitched into cheesemonger’s shop, as in e. m. Long period of repose of the cheese on the cheesemonger’s shelf. n. A cylindrical cavity made and piece taken out for a customer to taste. Portion of cylinder replaced. Air being let in, a part of the cheese becomes rotten, in which large worms are produced, giving rise to the story of the dragon. 〈EXPLANATION.〉 In order to discover the month in which the cheese was made, I remarked that, since it was turned over on its shelf in the cheese-room exactly 121 times, it must have been first placed there in some month which, together with the three succeeding months, had a number of days exactly equal to 121. {418} 〈CALCULATION.〉 I then computed the following Table:— Table of the number of Days contained in each four months, commencing on the first day of each month and ending on the last day of the fourth following month. Number of Days. 1 January to 30 April 120 1 February to 31 May 120 1 March to 30 June 122 1 April to 31 July 122 1 May to 31 August 123 1 June to 30 September 122 1 July to 31 October 123 1 August to 30 November 122 1 September to 31 December 122 1 October to 31 January 123 1 November to 28 February 120 1 December to 31 March 121 Now, from the preceding Table it appears that there is only one month in the year fulfilling this condition, namely, the month of March. It follows, therefore, that the cheese must have been made four months before, that is, in the month of December. Shortly after this vision I received a visit from that great geologist, the erudite Professor Ponderdunder,57 a member of all existing Academies, and Secretary of the most celebrated How-and-wi Academy for the Reconstruction of Primeval Time. I was anxious to have the opinion of this learned person upon my recent experience: but he was evidently envious of my vision, which he treated disrespectfully. {419} Possessed of an intellect which was anything but precocious, I had with much labour at last made him apprehend the arithmetic by which I had discovered the exact month of December in the date of the great series of 121 cataclysms, and I felt much mortified that he did not appreciate my ingenuity. All of a sudden he seemed intuitively to perceive the use that might be made of this vision. He then asked me with great earnestness whether I had communicated this new method of reasoning to any other person. On my answering in the negative, he entreated me not to say a word about it. He was especially anxious that Gardner Wilkinson, Layard, and Rawlinson should not get hold of it, lest they might anticipate the discovery which it would enable him to complete. He assured me that he could, by visiting Nineveh, and taking the Pyramids and Jericho on his road, with the aid of my formula, restore the true chronology from the creation. 57 Author of the celebrated Treatise “On the Entity of Space,” the basis of all sound metaphysical reasoning. 〈THE LEARNED PONDERDUNDER STARTS FOR JERICHO.〉 Having given him this promise, he left me, and immediately telegraphed to a very influential friend, the Vice-President who managed the How-and-wi Academy, suggesting that not a moment should be lost in authorizing him to set out on this expedition, which although painfully laborious to himself personally and not without peril, he was willing to undertake for the glory of the Academy, and from the religious conviction that it would enable him to refute the frightful heresy of Bishop Colenso. Within twenty-four hours the faithful telegraph brought him back the order to start and the credit necessary for his equipment. He soon completed the latter, and