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never daunted Atlas. If one said, "Two and two make Four" his
thought would be "Yes, damn it!"*
I now explain the language of Atlas. The third and greatest of
their philosophers saw that speech had wrought more harm than
good, and he consequently instituted a peculiar rite. Two men
were chosen by lot to preserve the language, which, by the way,
consisted of monosyllables only, two hundred and fourteen in
number, to each of which was attached a diacritical gesture,
usually ideographic.
Thus 'wrong' is given as 'phph' moving the jaw from right to
left. Wiping the brown with 'phph' means 'hot', hollowing the
hands over the mouth 'fire', striking the throat 'to die;' so
that each 'radicle' may have hundreds of gesture-derivatives.
Grammar, by the way, hardly existed, the quick apprehension of
the Atlanteans rendering it unnecessary.
These two men then departed to a cavern on the side of the
mountain just above the cliff, and there for a year they
remained, speaking the language and carving it symbolically upon
the rock. At the end of the year they returned; the elder is
sacrificed and the younger returns with a volunteer, usually one
who wishes to expiate a fault, and teaches him the language.
During his visit he observes whether any new thing needs a name,
and if so he invents it, and adds it to the language. This
process continued to the end. The rest of the people abandoned
altogether the use of speech, only a few years' practice enabling
them to dispense with the radicle. They then sought to do without
gesture, and in eight generations the difficulty was conquered,
and telepathy* established. Research then devoted itself to the
task of doing without thought; this will be discussed in detail
in the proper place. There was also a 'listener', three men who
took turns to sit upon the highest peak, above the 'light-
screens', and whose duty it was to give the alarm if any noise
disturbed Atlas. On their report that High Priest charged with
active governorship would take steps to ascertain and destroy the
cause.
The 'light-screens' spoken of were a contrivance of laminae of
a certain spar such that the light and heat of the sun were
completely cut off, not by opacity, but by what we call
'interference'. In this way other subtle rays of the sun entered
the 'house', these rays being supposed to be necessary to life.
These matters were the subjects of the deepest controversy. Some
held that these rays themselves were injurious and should be
excluded. Others considered that the light-screens should be put
in position during moonlight, instead of being opened at sunset,
as was the custom. This, however, was never attempted, the great
mass of the people being devoted to the moon. Others wished full
sunlight, the aim of Atlas being (they thought) to reach the sun.
But this theory contradicted the prime axiom of attaining things
through their opposites, and was only held by the lower classes,
who were not initiated into this doctrine.
The 'houses' of Atlas were carved from the living rock by the
action of Zro in its seventh precipitation. Enormously solid, the
walls were lofty and smoother than glass, though the pavements
were rough and broken almost everywhere for a reason which I am
not permitted to disclose. The passages were invariably narrow,
so that two persons could never pass each other. When two met, it
was the law to greet by joining in 'work' and then going away
together on their separate errands, or passing one above the
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