The greatest length or breadth of a full grown inhabitant of Flatland may be estimated at about eleven of your inches. Twelve inches may be regarded as a maximum.
Our Women are Straight Lines.
Our Soldiers and Lowest Classes of Workmen are Triangles with two equal sides, each about eleven inches long, and a base or third side so short (often not exceeding half an inch) that they form at their vertices a very sharp and formidable angle. Indeed when their bases are of the most degraded type (not more than the eighth part of an inch in size), they can hardly be distinguished1 from Straight Lines or Women; so extremely pointed2 are their vertices. With us, as with you, these Triangles are distinguished from others by being called Isosceles; and by this name I shall refer to them in the following pages.
Our Middle Class consists of Equilateral or Equal-Sided Triangles.
Our Professional Men and Gentlemen are Squares (to which class I myself belong) and Five-Sided Figures or Pentagons.
Next above these come the Nobility, of whom there are several degrees, beginning at Six-Sided Figures, or Hexagons, and from thence rising in the number of their sides till they receive the honourable3 title of Polygonal4, or many-sided. Finally when the number of the sides becomes so numerous, and the sides themselves so small, that the figure cannot be distinguished from a circle, he is included in the Circular or Priestly order; and this is the highest class of all.
It is a Law of Nature with us that a male child shall have one more side than his father, so that each generation shall rise (as a rule) one step in the scale of development and nobility. Thus the son of a Square is a Pentagon; the son of a Pentagon, a Hexagon; and so on.
But this rule applies not always to the Tradesmen, and still less often to the Soldiers, and to the Workmen; who indeed can hardly be said to deserve the name of human Figures, since they have not all their sides equal. With them therefore the Law of Nature does not hold; and the son of an Isosceles (i.e. a Triangle with two sides equal) remains5 Isosceles still. Nevertheless, all hope is not shut out, even from the Isosceles, that his posterity6 may ultimately rise above his degraded condition. For, after a long series of military successes, or diligent7 and skilful8 labours, it is generally found that the more intelligent among the Artisan and Soldier classes manifest a slight increase of their third side or base, and a shrinkage of the two other sides. Intermarriages (arranged by the Priests) between the sons and daughters of these more intellectual members of the lower classes generally result in an offspring approximating still more to the type of the Equal-Sided Triangle.
Rarely — in proportion to the vast numbers of Isosceles births — is a genuine and certifiable Equal-Sided Triangle produced from Isosceles parents.1 Such a birth requires, as its antecedents, not only a series of carefully arranged intermarriages, but also a long, continued exercise of frugality9 and self-control on the part of the would-be ancestors of the coming Equilateral, and a patient, systematic10, and continuous development of the Isosceles intellect through many generations.
The birth of a True Equilateral Triangle from Isosceles parents is the subject of rejoicing in our country for many furlongs around. After a strict examination conducted by the Sanitary11 and Social Board, the infant, if certified12 as Regular, is with solemn ceremonial admitted into the class of Equilaterals. He is then immediately taken from his proud yet sorrowing parents and adopted by some childless Equilateral, who is bound by oath never to permit the child henceforth to enter his former home or so much as to look upon his relations again, for fear lest the freshly developed organism may, by force of unconscious imitation, fall back again into his hereditary13 level.
The occasional emergence14 of an Equilateral from the ranks of his serf-born ancestors is welcomed, not only by the poor serfs themselves, as a gleam of light and hope shed upon the monotonous15 squalor of their existence, but also by the Aristocracy at large; for all the higher classes are well aware that these rare phenomena16, while they do little or nothing to vulgarize their own privileges, serve as a most useful barrier against revolution from below.
Had the acute-angled rabble17 been all, without exception, absolutely destitute18 of hope and of ambition, they might have found leaders in some of their many seditious outbreaks, so able as to render their superior numbers and strength too much even for the wisdom of the Circles. But a wise ordinance19 of Nature has decreed that, in proportion as the working-classes increase in intelligence, knowledge, and all virtue20, in that same proportion their acute angle (which makes them physically21 terrible) shall increase also and approximate to the comparatively harmless angle of the Equilateral Triangle. Thus, in the most brutal22 and formidable of the soldier class — creatures almost on a level with women in their lack of intelligence — it is found that, as they wax in the mental ability necessary to employ their tremendous penetrating23 power to advantage, so do they wane24 in the power of penetration25 itself.
How admirable is this Law of Compensation! And how perfect a proof of the natural fitness and, I may almost say, the divine origin of the aristocratic constitution of the States in Flatland! By a judicious26 use of this Law of Nature, the Polygons and Circles are almost always able to stifle27 sedition28 in its very cradle, taking advantage of the irrepressible and boundless29 hopefulness of the human mind. Art also comes to the aid of Law and Order. It is generally found possible — by a little artificial compression or expansion on the part of the State physicians — to make some of the more intelligent leaders of a rebellion perfectly30 Regular, and to admit them at once into the privileged classes; a much larger number, who are still below the standard, allured31 by the prospect32 of being ultimately ennobled, are induced to enter the State Hospitals, where they are kept in honourable confinement33 for life; one or two alone of the more obstinate34, foolish, and hopelessly irregular are led to execution.
Then the wretched rabble of the Isosceles, planless and leaderless, are either transfixed without resistance by the small body of their brethren whom the Chief Circle keeps in pay for emergencies of this kind; or else more often, by means of jealousies35 and suspicions skilfully36 fomented37 among them by the Circular party, they are stirred to mutual38 warfare39, and perish by one another’s angles. No less than one hundred and twenty rebellions are recorded in our annals, besides minor40 outbreaks numbered at two hundred and thirty-five; and they have all ended thus.
1 “What need of a certificate?” a Spaceland critic may ask: “Is not the procreation of a Square Son a certificate from Nature herself, proving the Equal-sidedness of the Father?” I reply that no Lady of any position will marry an uncertified Triangle. Square offspring has sometimes resulted from a slightly Irregular Triangle; but in almost every such case the Irregularity of the first generation is visited on the third; which either fails to attain41 the Pentagonal rank, or relapses to the Triangular42.
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1
distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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honourable
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| adj.可敬的；荣誉的，光荣的 | |
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polygonal
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| adj.多角形的，多边形的 | |
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remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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posterity
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| n.后裔，子孙，后代 | |
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7
diligent
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| adj.勤勉的，勤奋的 | |
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skilful
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| (=skillful)adj.灵巧的，熟练的 | |
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frugality
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| n.节约，节俭 | |
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systematic
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| adj.有系统的，有计划的，有方法的 | |
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sanitary
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| adj.卫生方面的，卫生的，清洁的，卫生的 | |
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certified
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| a.经证明合格的；具有证明文件的 | |
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hereditary
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| adj.遗传的，遗传性的，可继承的，世袭的 | |
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emergence
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| n.浮现，显现，出现，（植物）突出体 | |
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monotonous
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| adj.单调的，一成不变的，使人厌倦的 | |
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phenomena
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| n.现象 | |
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17
rabble
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| n.乌合之众，暴民；下等人 | |
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18
destitute
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| adj.缺乏的；穷困的 | |
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ordinance
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| n.法令；条令；条例 | |
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virtue
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| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
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physically
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| adj.物质上，体格上，身体上，按自然规律 | |
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brutal
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| adj.残忍的，野蛮的，不讲理的 | |
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23
penetrating
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| adj.（声音）响亮的，尖锐的adj.（气味）刺激的adj.（思想）敏锐的，有洞察力的 | |
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wane
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| n.衰微，亏缺，变弱；v.变小，亏缺，呈下弦 | |
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25
penetration
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| n.穿透，穿人，渗透 | |
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judicious
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| adj.明智的，明断的，能作出明智决定的 | |
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stifle
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| vt.使窒息；闷死；扼杀；抑止，阻止 | |
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sedition
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| n.煽动叛乱 | |
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boundless
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| adj.无限的；无边无际的；巨大的 | |
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perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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31
allured
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| 诱引，吸引( allure的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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prospect
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| n.前景，前途；景色，视野 | |
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33
confinement
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| n.幽禁，拘留，监禁；分娩；限制，局限 | |
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34
obstinate
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| adj.顽固的，倔强的，不易屈服的，较难治愈的 | |
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35
jealousies
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| n.妒忌( jealousy的名词复数 )；妒羡 | |
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36
skilfully
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| adv. (美skillfully)熟练地 | |
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37
fomented
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| v.激起，煽动（麻烦等）( foment的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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mutual
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| adj.相互的，彼此的；共同的，共有的 | |
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39
warfare
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| n.战争(状态)；斗争；冲突 | |
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40
minor
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| adj.较小(少)的，较次要的；n.辅修学科；vi.辅修 | |
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41
attain
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| vt.达到，获得，完成 | |
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42
triangular
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| adj.三角（形）的，三者间的 | |
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