The Seed of Evil

by Barrington J. Bayley

  The edition is remarkable for its spiritual chauvinism. By means of a wordy introduction and copious footnotes the editor strives to impress on the reader the superiority of the Christian world and of how unlikely it is that anything worthwhile could ever have taken place outside its confines. He puts forward a tenuous and wandering argument to show that Plato owed such wisdom as he did possess to Moses, “from whom he has borrowed that which is most rational and substantial in his works”. Noting that during his trial Socrates could have saved himself by withholding the truth but declined to do so, he exclaims passionately: “What a noble example is this in a pagan!”

  Noble in a pagan, indeed! And is it commonplace in a Christian? I cannot help but find these and other commentaries bizarre. For it is from Socrates that I have learned the qualities of rationality, coolness of mind, balanced feeling, justice—in short, the qualities of a sane and good-humoured civilisation. By contrast the extraordinary story of Jesus gives witness to the creation of the sinister uncivilisation that has conquered humanity, encompassed the globe, raised to unfeeling heights science and the technique of bureaucratic organisation—that has built airplanes.

  The tide of history must have tussled uncertainly with these two men as it decided which of them to cast up on the shore. For observe: both were sentenced to death as a result of unjust accusations (though Socrates with a lighter heart). History is rarely arbitrary about these matters. Further, observe the curious affinity between the valedictions of their biographers—not in content, it is true, but in mood, in tone, in feeling—as if they comprised two strands of a single cord.

  Thus Plato has Phedon say: “This, Echecrates, was the exit of our friend, a man who, as it appears to me, was the best man of our time with whom we were acquainted, and besides this the wisest and most just.”

  St John concludes: “There were many other things which Jesus did, which if they were to be written down every one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written.”

  But to my thesis: my contention is that not merely some, but every particle of the common conception of Christ and his role in the world is false. We are told that he entered the world as a moral force to save the world, that all who heed him will be redeemed. That if the world opens its heart to him, mankind will be transformed. If now we find that doors are closed, that some are excluded from the feast, it is because Christ has not yet touched the hearts of all men. To this I counter that, by holding to this creed, the Christians are looking into a reversed mirror image of their religion, the obverse of which is the world as it exists today. Compare: other teachings exhibit an open-ended liberation; in contrast to the smile of Buddha, the systemless jokes of the Zen masters, the story of Christ is one of persecution; of a series of progressively closing traps: the last supper; the betrayal in the garden of Gethsemane; the nailing to the cross; the descent into Hell. Is that not descriptive of the modern world, which progressively encloses the individual?

  Again, where other teachers inspire detachment, wisdom, justice and friendship, Christ invoked not abstract qualities but deeds—and so inaugurated the tumultuous industriousness of the modern world. There are other close parallels too numerous to be ignored: the refusal of a petition to authority when in dire distress (“Father, all things are possible unto thee; take away this cup from me.”—St Mark, Ch. 14, verse 36); the washing of hands; the freeing of the guilty in order that the innocent may be punished (“Away with this man and give us Barabbas”—St Luke, Ch. 23, verse 18).

  Has it not come to pass that “to him that hath, more shall be given, while to him that hath little even that which he hath shall be taken away”?

  And am I not the seed that, not even falling on stony ground, fails to reach earth at all?

  Mankind has absorbed the message of Jesus, absorbed it fully and without omission; the story of the passion has been blended into the world and transformed into vaster fact, like a mustard seed that grows into a monstrous bush. Alone among the cheerful smiling reason of other world teachers Christ never laughed but groaned and wept. Perhaps he wept because he saw the consequences of his mission, much as my mother wept to realise that her actions had condemned me to the life of an air passenger.

  Once these correspondences are marshalled the genesis of the present-day world culture becomes all to clear. Only one point remains obscure: what was Christ’s origin? Possibly he was indeed an incarnation of the Creator, sent to scourge mankind. Pursuing the Christian cosmology, I would be more inclined to name him as an agent of Satan, dispatched to corrupt the soul of humanity and destroy for all time the Socratic civilisation which might otherwise have flourished in Western Europe.

  These scanty comments must suffice to outline my thesis, for I become too weary to expatiate further. How the world would judge my intellectual offering I cannot know; perhaps it is unscholarly, naive, jejune even, when placed against better-considered world systems. But for me it carries the inner conviction of a truth revealed. Besides—my role in the world drama, minuscule though it may be, gives me one thing in common with Jesus: I also am pinned to a cross, this flying cross which whines ceaselessly to and fro across the face of the globe.

  The hebetude into which my parents sank claims me also. I shall not live much longer now. Most of my time, when not sleeping, I spend gazing through the fuselage window. At night the unbreakable glass becomes a mirror which returns my tired face. To be honest it is a handsome face. The nose is strong, the lips are full, the eyes are sensitive—but withdrawn. And the hair, brushed neatly back, is prematurely white. In fact the whole face looks about thirty years older than it really is and its calmness, one sees after a while, is a forced, resigned calmness. Anyway, now that, with a frank feeling of relief, I contemplate my approaching death, I will go through the formality of setting forth final arrangements. To anyone who can use it I bequeath the legacy left to me by my father: two second-class one-way air tickets from Nairobi to London, still valid. For my epitaph I choose yet another quotation from that prophetic New Testament, and one which demonstrates even more clearly the applicability of the gospels to our time: “The birds have their nests, the foxes have their holes, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.”

  Wizard Wazo’s Revenge

  Wizard Wazo was angry and exasperated as he quit the planet Nekferus. A Mighty One of the Galactic Observance was accustomed to being obeyed; yet the benighted inhabitants of that infernal place seemed not even to understand what it meant to face a galactic wizard!

  No member of his order could have been active in the region recently, for there would have been no question about it a few millennia ago. As it was he had intended only a short stay, to carry out an experiment that on the prompting of the moment had suddenly occurred to him, and he had made no excessive demands. All he required was a hundred or so female concubines, premises and provisions consistent with his comfort, and the instruments necessary for the experiment itself, which would not have engaged more than a third of the planet’s industrial capacity. Yet his modest requests had met with incredulity and laughter! It had not at first penetrated to him that these wretches were actually refusing his demands. When it did his temper had broken, and he had laid a curse on them for their recalcitrance.

  “I cast a mental screen around this world,” he had mouthed. “Henceforth nothing that is original in thought shall reach this planet. Your children, and their children, and so ad infinitum, shall live in the greyness of thought already much used, shall never discover a new idea, for this screen is impassable to ideas and all new perceptions, which come, though you know it not, from outermost space. Thus I punish you for the absence of your imagination!”

  And in a sputter of sparks he had disappeared from their view.

  So it was that Wizard Wazo was already bad-tempered when, upon dismissing the experiment from his mind (it was not important), he instead decided to visit various places so as to collect the property he had left in safekeeping befo
re embarking on his pilgrimage.

  In space now, a glance at the surrounding stars located his first destination: the planet Earth. With the immediacy of directed thought, faster than light, faster than causality, he set forth. Transient bodies formed and dissipated about his presence as he entered first the nimbus of Earth’s sun and then the nimbus of the planet itself: bodies of light, of magnetism, of radioactivity, of air and vapour. Speeding down through the atmosphere, he saw below him some pyramidal structures erected during his last stay here, and while pleased to see that they still stood, he remarked grumpily to himself that it would have been a simple matter to keep their original limestone dressings in good order. But Egypt, as it happened, was not his destination, for it was not where his property was currently to be found. He materialised instead on the sidewalk of a busy city street, somewhere to the north-west.

  All around him was an irregular roaring, confused and continuous. This noise was accompanied by copious exhalations of carbonised fumes and was created, he saw, by a steady stream of automotive conveyances that passed through the central concourse.

  At least it was no worse, he told himself, than the stink expelled from the rear of that execrable Earth animal the horse, that had made the streets of Memphis almost unendurable.

  Terraces of tall buildings, many of them glass-fronted, lined the avenue. Behind the transparent panes goods and services were on offer. One could, for instance, repose for a while and consume food and drink. He would take up this offer, Wizard Wazo told himself, but first he must find the custodian of his property.

  He inspected the body that had finally formed around his presence. He found it to be a handsome specimen of the species inhabiting Earth, sturdily built, a little over average height, clad in a grey check suit. His skin was swarthy; bushy mustachios grew on his upper lip. An unusual feature, for this city, was the headgear he wore—a fez, which he believed was currently more characteristic of the Egypt he had previously visited.

  Wizard Wazo walked along the crowded pavement, requiring all others to make way for him. He did not falter when he came to a road junction but sauntered across it with the same confidence, sensing the oil-driven vehicles as they surged around him and knowing that none would strike him.

  Here, now, was something of interest. A small, crouched man in a scruffy white gown dispensed dollops of frozen confectionery scooped into wafer cones from a trolley. Wizard Wazo was reminded of the iced drinks that had been available in ancient Egypt, and it brightened him to see that the art of making ice had not been lost since then.

  At any rate he decided to sample this delicacy. Halting by the trolley, he pointed to a customer just leaving and nodded his head. Slowly the vendor filled another wafer cone, avoiding Wizard Wazo’s eye and pursing his lips calculatingly.

  “Forty pence,” he said peremptorily as he held out the cone.

  After a pause Wizard Wazo reached into an inside jacket pocket and pulled out a leather folder. He found therein some pieces of richly engraved paper which he divined were notes of currency. Drawing out one bearing the legend “Ten Pounds”, he handed it over, receiving in exchange the ice cream cone.

  Ostentatiously the vendor rummaged in a tray of metal discs. “Ten, twenny, firty, sixty, there y’are then, that’s all yer get,” he said, throwing coins into Wizard Wazo’s hand. Dismissively he turned away. Wizard Wazo did not move. He looked into the pinched, hostile face of the ice-cream vendor.

  Then, knowing already what he would find there, he looked into the man’s mind.

  Yes, this wretch had attempted to cheat him! Had taken a note of large denomination and had given trifling tokens in exchange, leaving an enormous discrepancy between them and the proper price of the delicacy! And why? Because he hoped, from Wizard Wazo’s foreign appearance, that he would not know the value of the local currency!

  “Thief!” Wizard Wazo thundered. “Give me my money this instant!”

  The vendor’s response was aggressive. “Yer’ve ‘ad yer lot, mate, don’t come ‘ere wiv yer bleedin’—”

  Wizard Wazo bridled. One word from him and the contents of the ice-cream tub would turn to a vilely stinking mass. But he did no more than throw down the cone he had purchased and, with a gesture of disgust, continue on his way.

  Further down the street he stopped again and peered through the plate-glass window of a somewhat shabby restaurant. Within, men and women sat at bare board tables, drinking tea and coffee, reading books and newspapers, talking to one another, wasting time. The man he sought sat alone in a corner, sometimes watching those around him, sometimes reading a book he held in one hand. From outside, Wizard Wazo read the title: Flying Saucers: The Conspiracy of Silence. The man was lantern-jawed, with straight black hair, and had an air of unsettled energy. He puffed nervously on a cigarette, which he put down from time to time to sip coffee from a cup in front of him.

  In keeping with the etiquette between magicians, Wizard Wazo refrained from scanning the other’s mind. He moved into the restaurant and made his way to the corner table.

  The man barely glanced up at the stranger who sat down opposite him. Wizard Wazo leaned forward. “I am in the presence of the Master of the Order of the Secret Star,” he stated. “That much I know. Allow me to introduce myself. I am Wizard Wazo, Mighty One of the Galactic Observance. I am here to recover my words of power, left in safekeeping with you.”

  Arnold Madders drew on his cigarette with a sucking sound and looked blankly at the swarthy-faced individual, vaguely oriental-looking with his hypnotic eyes and eccentric hat, who accosted him. He coughed, shook his head, and waved Wizard Wazo away. Though slightly disconcerted, Wizard Wazo tucked in his chin, and in a quiet, confidential tone, uttered a series of thrilling syllables.

  “Abaradazazazaz.”

  He chuckled when the vibrations had died away. “You see, I know the secret word of your order. Was it not I who gave you this word? Now we must repair to a private place. You will gather your adepts, those who have the words of power, and they will give them up to me.”

  Madders did not look up from his book. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said tonelessly. “I haven’t got anything of yours.”

  Who is this lunatic? Madders wondered. It annoyed him to have strangers come up and start talking about the Secret Star, which he had tried hard to keep on the straight and narrow of an esoteric society. Still, it was hard to keep anything secret these days, with so much occult stuff about. Davies must have been blabbing again, he thought.

  The initiation word, though. … Where had this guy got that? From the British Museum, probably, just as Madders himself had.

  Wizard Wazo spoke more insistently, though still keeping his tone on the level of polite conversation. “I have just returned from my mission to find the end of space. Now I need my words of power, to carry out the many projects that all the time, even while I am speaking to you, are occurring to my intellect.”

  Madders looked up from his book. He smiled sarcastically, expelling smoke from the corner of his mouth. “The end of space, yet! Find it all right?”

  Wizard Wazo blinked. “Of course I did not find it. Space has no end. Therein lies the meaning of the pilgrimage.”

  Madders snorted. Wizard Wazo felt puzzled, even bewildered. A certain amount of fencing between wizards was not uncommon, but this man behaved as though they were of equal rank! As though he himself had been trained by the Galactic Observance!

  Even so, Wizard Wazo remained patient. “Come, let us understand one another,” he said jovially. “I do not doubt that you have attained much. It is not to be supposed that your order has been idle for the last five thousand years. And did I not find even then adepts in Egypt, men who understood the use of words? Even lacking your—” he indicated the street outside, searching for a phrase—“your oil-driven machinery, they were able to erect the square-based quintahedra.”

  “Quintahedra?”

  “Models of planetary existence. Pyramids, you
call them. Ah, but they were a splendid sight—faced with white limestone, the upper surfaces sheathed in brilliant gold. At summer solstice they reflected the light of the sun out over the desert—vast four-armed stars, shining on the floor of the desert! Wonderful! It is regrettable that your order has not seen fit to attend to their repair.”

  Madders said nothing, and Wizard Wazo grew worried. He cast his mind back to the time when he had unloaded his property onto this man’s ancestors.

  Words of power were heavy in the consciousness, even when only lodged in the memory. They could act as impedimenta to that mode of travel known as the immediacy of thought. Therefore Wizard Wazo had been obliged to lighten himself for his heroic pilgrimage to the nonexistent limit of space, to strip down his memory in order to attain the greatest possible thought-velocity. He could on no account divest himself of his standard repertoire, but there were other, specialised words, with ponderous vibrational sequences, that were very weighty. These he had cached with various people, on various planets.

  In Egypt he had founded the Order of the Secret Star, entrusting a number of his words to the order for it to guard and preserve—on condition, of course, that no attempt was to be made to activate them (which the order did not have the conscious force to do in any case). As a reward for this service he had taught the order some magical techniques and a few lesser words which could bring practical results. Undoubtedly the Order of the Secret Star was by now one of the groups clandestinely controlling Earth civilisation.

  A chilling thought occurred to Wizard Wazo. He had already discovered that this planet abounded in thieves and villains. Could it be that the Order of the Secret Star had decided to renege on its agreement? That it intended to keep the words of power for itself, in the hope of being able to make use of them some day? It was tempting to enter the other’s mind to ascertain the truth of this suspicion … but Wizard Wazo restrained himself from so improper a step. In any case there could be no question of extracting his property by force. Words of power had to be imparted with the consent of both parties, otherwise they lost their efficacy.