To imagine a world within our world—a world beneath our world. It is impossible.
Yet I have explained to you my horror within the cave and I have admitted my confusion. I had expected them to worship the stars they had created, but they scarcely noticed them. I had expected them to be afraid of the dark that time had formed, but instead they filled it with lights. I had believed them to be celebrants of power, but they simply chattered to one another, hour by hour, about nothing in particular. How could I possibly have dreamed of this? When I spoke to their souls, the unhappy voices were a revelation; they asked me questions, but I dared not answer in case I spread terror among them. Why should I invent such things, only to be greeted with laughter by you all? I tell you, I have seen a real world.
You say that they were constrained by this—time— which did not even exist. So they were enslaved to a concept which they themselves had invented? Do you expect us to believe this?
I—
You say that they did not worship their stars. So what god did they reverence?
It is not a question of—
They had no god. The people of Mouldwarp believed that they lived in a material world. Is that so?
It is so.
Knowing that material is finite, then, they decided to conquer rather than to worship time and the stars. They proclaimed their liberty, and yet they were slaves of instinct and suggestion. They declared their freedom of speech and freedom of belief, and yet they were never really free. All this we deduce from your own account.
You speak of slavish instinct, but I saw energy and exhilaration. Perhaps you are correct in believing that they wished to conquer their material world, but this afforded them a sense of progress.
But why, then, did they have no sense of the sacred?
They did not need it! They were truly free, since they believed that they were in control of their own destinies. Think of your own lives now. They are empty, precisely because you wish them to be without meaning. You believe that there is no meaning.
That is false. We know that we are the meaning. This session is now ended. Let the bells ring out.
40
Madrigal: Did you attend the session?
Sidonia: Of course. It was entertaining. Plato and the guardians stood opposite each other on the hills, while we sat between them on the banks of the Fleet.
Madrigal: Ornatus told me that he could hear the voices of the guardians from the bridge. They sounded, to him, very vibrant. Very expressive. He could also hear the citizens murmuring.
Sidonia: Some of them were tired. I had brought my own resting place, because I knew that it was going to be a long affair. As one citizen said, we might have entered another new age before it was finished. Even Plato laughed at that.
Madrigal: But surely Plato is talking nonsense? There is no above or below. No outward or inward. Nothing that exists is hidden from human sight.
Sidonia: Apparently not. But Plato has always defied our expectations.
Madrigal: And how could he have ventured into this underground world of Mouldwarp if it only existed in three or four dimensions?
Sidonia: He would certainly feel the pinch. Why are you laughing?
Madrigal: Did you hear the funny story from Sparkler?
Sidonia: What story?
Madrigal: He was going towards the temple to be healed, when Plato stopped him. Do you know what he said? ‘Better that you should explore your illness and learn from your suffering, Sparkler, rather than desire to be cured.’
Sidonia: I suppose Sparkler had something to say about that?
Madrigal: Oh yes. ‘Plato,’ he said, ‘you may think you are a very clever person. You have always been clever, ever since we first met at the ceremony of naming. But sometimes, I believe, you know nothing.’
Sidonia: And Plato?
Madrigal: He danced.
Sidonia: What?
Madrigal: He danced upon the earth. And then he replied with some kind of chant. ‘Sparkler,’ he sang, ‘your light still sparkles but you do not see. I am clever because I know nothing.’
Sidonia: What an extraordinary statement! And yet, in Plato’s case, I have become accustomed to the extraordinary.
41
Sidonia: I am concerned for you. You seem lost to us.
Plato: Does it matter?
Sidonia: But in your arguments you miss so much. Our world is gentler than you admit. Do you know, for example, what I do when I am alone? I float in a dream of my own and, sometimes, the angels join me.
Plato: Do you speak to them?
Sidonia: No. They whisper to me, but I can never understand them.
Plato: They have been with us since the beginning of the world and still they can only whisper.
Sidonia: Sometimes I hear them in music.
Plato: And in the voices of children.
Sidonia: But why are they here?
Plato: There is no other place for them. Yet at the same time they exist everywhere. This is what I am now beginning to understand—
Sidonia: I was conversing with Madrigal—
Plato: Madrigal is very wise, but he is impatient for the truth. He does not listen. Sparkler and Ornatus are the same. Yet that is not so strange. The parishioners of Newgate are known for their bad temper, and those of St Giles for their charity. So in turn the citizens of our parish may be known for their impatience.
Sidonia: The impatient inhabitants of Pie Corner? An interesting theory. That was what I was telling Madrigal. From you, Plato, he must expect the unusual.
Plato: There sounds the bell for the next session. I hope that I can satisfy him.
42
Throw yourself upon our mercy, Plato. Trust us.
I can trust only my destiny. Whether I stand or fall here, I could not have acted otherwise. I can no more change my life than I can alter the colour of my eyes. They are white, like yours, and my conscience is white.
Conscience is knowledge with others. Here we are all one city. We are the limbs of the city. We are a common body. How can you wish to part yourself from us?
I have been granted a vision and I must declare it. I can do no other.
You know well enough that we can have no separate visions. It is impossible. Worse: it is blasphemy.
I do not act alone, as you seem to think. I have my soul. She led me forward on my journey.
43
Plato: Where were you when I needed you, in Golden Lane?
Soul: You always need me. And, you must admit, I ask for very little in return. But I will ask you this: are you determined to go forward into the cave?
Plato: Forward? It may be backward.
Soul: You were the one who wished to visit this place. I am here to accompany you, not to lead you.
Plato: The rain might fall here, as it did in the old days. The wind might blow and the dew form.
Soul: The old days. Always the old days. Can you survive the heat of their false sun? Can you live in their dust?
Plato: I admit that I am afraid of those things. I am afraid of their teeming life. Of their blind instinct to grow. Listen. Can you hear the voices?
Soul: I hear nothing.
Plato: I feel that I am close to them.
Soul: You may have heard them. But are you sure that they are not within your own mind?
44
More blasphemy. Our souls do not speak to us.
How can you be sure?
Our souls do not appear to us.
That is not true. I slept after my journey and, when I awoke, she was sitting beside me. She was singing to herself, I remember, and then I opened my eyes.
45
Plato: For how long have I been gone?
Soul: It is hard to say.
Plato: Where did you find me?
Soul: Here. Among your papers.
Plato: It was a hard journey. It was as if I were entering the cave and travelling beneath our earth. Could there have been such a place?
Soul: If you sa
w it, then it exists.
Plato: So it was not a vision? Or a dream?
Soul: What do you think?
Plato: I believe it to have been real.
Soul: And in turn I believe you. Of course, it may not be so easy to persuade the others.
Plato: Others?
Soul: But at least you have taken the first step. You have seen what was once unimaginable.
Plato: What is the saying? ‘My eyes have been opened.’ Now I must begin to wake my companions.
46
So you refuse to believe that I travelled to a dark cave in which the ancient inhabitants of London dwelled? Citizens, listen to me. Please listen. Perhaps I was mistaken. I had felt and believed that I was travelling beneath the earth, but that may have been my own lack of imagination. Perhaps they are all around us, but we cannot see one another. Now you are laughing again. You prove my point. It may be that we refuse to see them. Or they refuse to see us. I am not sure. Somehow we have all become separated. But I know this: our world and their world are intermingled.
47
Your own words condemn you. You confess to doubts about your journey and yet you expect us to believe your stories?
I have always taught stories. How our souls first came to light in the Age of Orpheus, when the divine human awoke from slumber and embraced us. How, in the malign Age of the Apostles, we learned to worship and suffer. I shall speak no more of Mouldwarp, but I have taught that the succeeding Age of Witspell witnessed a reawakening and restoration of human power. We look back at them with great attention. We have established an Academy for the sole purpose of studying the beliefs of these past ages. But are we in a position to examine and to judge those who came before us? What if they are still examining us?
You are truly remarkable, Plato. You change your argument at every turn.
I am merely speculating. I assert nothing. It has always been my belief that speculation can do no harm.
It is not necessarily ours.
So, after all, I am to be condemned for challenging your beliefs? Then surely this age is no better than any that has come before.
Once more your head is filled with dreams and delusions.
Have you ever considered that our lives are a form of dream and that it is time to awake? What if we are being dreamed by the people of Mouldwarp? And what if we were dreaming them? What if the divine human had never woken and all the ages were part of the fabric of his sleep?
This is foolishness, Plato. Enough. We know that we exist. We know our history. We are not the figments of anyone’s imagination.
Forgive me. I thought it was the city custom that I should be allowed to speak freely and openly in my defence. If I am permitted to reveal all that I have thought and imagined, after my journey, then perhaps the citizens will reject the charges of falsehood against me.
Yes. They signal their assent. It is allowed. Continue.
48
Sparkler: For so frail a figure, he has a powerful voice.
Ornatus: No. Not powerful. Piercing. Somehow one always feels obliged to listen to him. He has always been full of ideas. I remember once, when we were children, he had a theory about the lambs of Lambeth. I cannot recall any of it now. I just remember his little face puckered up in sorrow, and his piping voice.
Sparkler: Look. He is hitching up the sleeves of his robe.
Ornatus: It has always been too large for him.
Sparkler: Did I tell you of my encounter with him, when I was about to be healed?
Ornatus: Of course. You have told everyone.
Sparkler: My apologies. Do you see his hands pointing upwards as he speaks? He is describing the old city again—
Ornatus: A phantom from his dreams.
Sparkler: Are you sure? He is describing its domes and high buildings and wide streets. There were once stars in a night sky. There was a sun, casting shadows upon the earth.
Ornatus: Next he will be saying that these shadows were souls.
Sparkler: You should not treat his story so lightly, Ornatus. What if all were true?
Ornatus: Why would it matter, true or not? One age is enough for me.
Sparkler: So you would prefer to remain in ignorance?
Ornatus: Ignorance is better than doubt.
Sparkler: Yet Plato has begun a process which will not end—
Ornatus: This is precisely why I condemn him. He has introduced uncertainty among us.
Sparkler: ‘And if we doubt, the world goes out.’ Who said that?
Ornatus: Can we please not discuss these matters? What is Plato doing now?
Sparkler: He is drawing some symbol or letter in the earth.
Ornatus: Absurd. Who can be expected to see it from here?
Sparkler: Do stop talking, Ornatus. Then we will be able to hear him. Look. Even the angels are interested. The tips of their wings have changed colour.
The people of Mouldwarp did not know why they believed in science. They knew only that it was absurd not to believe. And their science worked in their dimensions! They could move quickly from place to place, converse with one another over long distances, and see one another in different regions of the earth.
Ornatus: Three of the most foolish activities one can imagine.
Sparkler: Hush.
Science created a great reality for them. It manufactured planets, and stars, and medicines. Can we truly believe them to be primitive?
Ornatus: Oh yes. Certainly.
Sparkler: He speaks with great conviction.
Do you remember what one of the guardians told me during the first session? ‘We do not wish to build our own monuments or memorials, since, unlike those who came before us, we wish to efface ourselves. All objects dissolve, so we choose not to make them.’ Do you recall his words? Well, let me tell you this. We are astounded by our ancestors and their misconceptions, but we may seem equally foolish to our successors. In the distant villages of the hammer and the smith, as you know, dwell those who believe themselves to be already dead. They neither eat nor drink, but they survive their allotted span. May I prophesy? We will become like them, dying in life, if we refuse to countenance the presence of other realities around us.
Ornatus: This is madness. Can he truly believe what he says?
Sparkler: Do you see how some of the citizens are becoming restless?
Ornatus: Bewildered, too.
Sparkler: It is almost finished. The next session, according to custom, will also be the last.
Ornatus: I will be truly thankful.
49
Ours is a great and ancient city, with its own sacred rites. The citizens will assemble at the several gates, according to their parish, where the charges against you will once more be recited. Then they will sleep and, immediately on waking, they will know whether you are in a state of innocence or guilt. The spirit of the city will guide them. Of course you must then confer upon yourself whatever sentence you deem to be just. We have no part in that.
And should I decide to give orations as before?
That is your right. It will be after, not before, and that is enough for us. It will not be the same city and you will not be the same person. Now, with your permission, may we draw these proceedings to a close?
I am allowed a last petition, am I not?
If you wish it, then it is so. Proceed.
The Judgment Upon Plato
50
Citizens who live beside the bishop’s gate! You have heard how Plato defended himself and how he argued with the orators. What a vigorous performance that was! But how severely was he criticised for his excesses! In these great debates, however, you are the arbiters whose judgment abides. After taking part in the communal feast you will sleep and, when you awake, you will know the truth.
51
Sidonia: I’m afraid that I missed most of Plato’s closing submission. Was it interesting?
Madrigal: Very fine indeed. It reminded me of our days at the Academy. There were many questions and interventio
ns. Shall I try—
Sidonia: If you would.
Madrigal: Plato said:
Tell me, what is it that we presume to understand? Ask any citizen and you will receive no true answer. And yet we condemn past ages for their absurd beliefs! Ah. I am wrong again: we are certain of one thing. We know that for a while we are consigned to the wrong dimensions and that, at some point, they will pass away. There is a grief box in every parish where we can express our anxiety without being observed. I ask you if this is the way to live. I can no longer endure our patience, our endless worship, our expectation. Some of us grow old and fade. I have seen my own mother begin to depart, until she was scarcely visible even to me. Was this well done? Was this, in the words of the guardians, as it should be? I am not telling you that all is wrong, or all is well. I am simply asking you to question and, perhaps, to see the world in different ways. I have done so, upon my journey. I was stripped of all my certainties and felt physically afraid. But I survived, did I not? I want you to consider other possibilities. In that respect, at least, we may be more fortunate than those who came before us. I was once your orator. May I be permitted to impart one last lesson? I know that other ages, like that of Mouldwarp, refused to countenance or understand any reality but their own. That is why they perished. If we do not learn to doubt, then perhaps our own age will die. Now you are laughing at me again. Perhaps I have become a fool, to make you wise. What did you cry? I am out of harmony? I have always been so! Do you remember that in school we were taught that to be beautiful is to be virtuous? You see that I do not exactly fulfil the criterion of physical beauty. My body does not conform to the divine pattern of harmony. So I learned that I must follow my own path. You say that I have therefore departed from the proper way, but let me elucidate my own law of harmony. I would rather despise the whole world than be out of harmony with my own self. If others condemn me, then I will stand alone.
The Plato Papers Page 8