Although I had less than a minute for reflection, I felt, by a kind of instinct, that I must
conceal my experiences from my Wife. Not that I apprehended, at the moment, any
danger from her divulging my secret, but I knew that to any Woman in Flatland the
narrative of my adventures must needs be unintelligible. So I endeavoured to reassure her
by some story, invented for the occasion, that I had accidentally fallen through the trap-
door of the cellar, and had there lain stunned.
The Southward attraction in our country is so slight that even to a Woman my tale
necessarily appeared extraordinary and well-nigh incredible; but my Wife, whose good
sense far exceeds that of the average of her Sex, and who perceived that I was unusually
excited, did not argue with me on the subject, but insisted that I was ill and required
repose. I was glad of an excuse for retiring to my chamber to think quietly over what had
happened. When I was at last by myself, a drowsy sensation fell on me; but before my
eyes closed I endeavoured to reproduce the Third Dimension, and especially the process
by which a Cube is constructed through the motion of a Square. It was not so clear as I
could have wished; but I remembered that it must be "Upward, and yet not Northward",
and I determined steadfastly to retain these words as the clue which, if firmly grasped,
could not fail to guide me to the solution. So mechanically repeating, like a charm, the
words, "Upward, yet not Northward", I fell into a sound refreshing sleep.
During my slumber I had a dream. I thought I was once more by the side of the Sphere,
whose lustrous hue betokened that he had exchanged his wrath against me for perfect
placability. We were moving together towards a bright but infinitesimally small Point, to
which my Master directed my attention. As we approached, methought there issued from
it a slight humming noise as from one of your Spaceland bluebottles, only less resonant
by far, so slight indeed that even in the perfect stillness of the Vacuum through which we
soared, the sound reached not our ears till we checked our flight at a distance from it of
something under twenty human diagonals.
"Look yonder," said my Guide, "in Flatland thou hast lived; of Lineland thou hast
received a vision; thou hast soared with me to the heights of Spaceland; now, in order to
complete the range of thy experience, I conduct thee downward to the lowest depth of
existence, even to the realm of Pointland, the Abyss of No dimensions.
"Behold yon miserable creature. That Point is a Being like ourselves, but confined to the
non-dimensional Gulf. He is himself his own World, his own Universe; of any other than
himself he can form no conception; he knows not Length, nor Breadth, nor Height, for he
has had no experience of them; he has no cognizance even of the number Two; nor has he
a thought of Plurality; for he is himself his One and All, being really Nothing. Yet mark
his perfect self-contentment, and hence learn this lesson, that to be self-contented is to be
vile and ignorant, and that to aspire is better than to be blindly and impotently happy.
Now listen."
