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Weinbaum + </title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + p {margin-top: .75em; text-align: justify; margin-bottom: .75em;} + + h1 {text-align: center; clear: both; margin-bottom: 2em;} + + hr {width: 33%; margin: 2em auto; clear: both;} + + body{margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + + .trans1 {border: solid 1px; margin: 2em 15% 4em; padding: 1em; text-align: justify;} + + p.cap:first-letter {padding-left: 50%; vertical-align: baseline; font-size: 4em; line-height: .7em;} + p.cap:first-line {font-variant: small-caps;} + + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Ideal, by Stanley Grauman Weinbaum + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Ideal + +Author: Stanley Grauman Weinbaum + +Release Date: October 5, 2007 [EBook #22897] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE IDEAL *** + + + + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Stephen Blundell and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +</pre> + + + + + + +<div class="trans1"><b>Transcriber's Note:</b><br /> +This etext was produced from <i>A Martian Odyssey and Others</i> published in 1949. Extensive +research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this +publication was renewed. Minor spelling and typographical errors have been corrected +without note.</div> + + + + +<h1>THE IDEAL</h1> + + + +<p class="cap"><i>"This," said the Franciscan, "is +my Automaton, who at the proper time will speak, answer whatsoever +question I may ask, and reveal all secret knowledge to +me." He smiled as he laid his hand affectionately on the iron +skull that topped the pedestal.</i></p> + +<p><i>The youth gazed open-mouthed, first at the head and then +at the Friar. "But it's iron!" he whispered. "The head is iron, +good father."</i></p> + +<p><i>"Iron without, skill within, my son," said Roger Bacon. +"It will speak, at the proper time and in its own manner, for +so have I made it. A clever man can twist the devil's arts to +God's ends, thereby cheating the fiend—Sst! There sounds vespers!</i> +Plena gratia, ave Virgo—"</p> + +<p><i>But it did not speak. Long hours, long weeks, the</i> doctor +mirabilis <i>watched his creation, but iron lips were silent and the +iron eyes dull, and no voice but the great man's own sounded +in his monkish cell, nor was there ever an answer to all the +questions that he asked—until one day when he sat surveying +his work, composing a letter to Duns Scotus in distant Cologne—one +day—</i></p> + +<p><i>"Time is!" said the image, and smiled benignly.</i></p> + +<p><i>The Friar looked up. "Time is, indeed," he echoed. "Time +it is that you give utterance, and to some assertion less obvious +than that time is. For of course time is, else there were nothing +at all. Without time—"</i></p> + +<p><i>"Time was!" rumbled the image, still smiling, but sternly +at the statue of Draco.</i></p> + +<p><i>"Indeed time was," said the Monk. "Time was, is, and +will be, for time is that medium in which events occur. Matter +exists in space, but events—"</i></p> + +<p><i>The image smiled no longer. "Time is past!" it roared in +tones deep as the cathedral bell outside, and burst into ten +thousand pieces</i>.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>"There," said old Haskel van Manderpootz, shutting the +book, "is my classical authority in this experiment. This story, +overlaid as it is with mediæval myth and legend, proves that +Roger Bacon himself attempted the experiment—and failed." +He shook a long finger at me. "Yet do not get the impression, +Dixon, that Friar Bacon was not a great man. He was—extremely +great, in fact; he lighted the torch that his namesake +Francis Bacon took up four centuries later, and that now van +Manderpootz rekindles."</p> + +<p>I stared in silence.</p> + +<p>"Indeed," resumed the Professor, "Roger Bacon might almost +be called a thirteenth century van Manderpootz, or van +Manderpootz a twenty-first century Roger Bacon. His <i>Opus +Majus</i>, <i>Opus Minus</i>, and <i>Opus Tertium</i>—"</p> + +<p>"What," I interrupted impatiently, "has all this to do with—that?" +I indicated the clumsy metal robot standing in the +corner of the laboratory.</p> + +<p>"Don't interrupt!" snapped van Manderpootz. "I'll—"</p> + +<p>At this point I fell out of my chair. The mass of metal +had ejaculated something like "<i>A-a-gh-rasp</i>" and had lunged a +single pace toward the window, arms upraised. "What the +devil!" I sputtered as the thing dropped its arms and returned +stolidly to its place.</p> + +<p>"A car must have passed in the alley," said van Manderpootz +indifferently. "Now as I was saying, Roger Bacon—"</p> + +<p>I ceased to listen. When van Manderpootz is determined +to finish a statement, interruptions are worse than futile. As +an ex-student of his, I know. So I permitted my thoughts to +drift to certain personal problems of my own, particularly Tips +Alva, who was the most pressing problem of the moment. Yes, +I mean Tips Alva the 'vision dancer, the little blonde imp who +entertains on the Yerba Mate hour for that Brazilian company. +Chorus girls, dancers, and television stars are a weakness of mine; +maybe it indicates that there's a latent artistic soul in me. Maybe.</p> + +<p>I'm Dixon Wells, you know, scion of the N. J. Wells +Corporation, Engineers Extraordinary. I'm supposed to be an +engineer myself; I say supposed, because in the seven years since +my graduation, my father hasn't given me much opportunity to +prove it. He has a strong sense of value of time, and I'm cursed +with the unenviable quality of being late to anything and for +everything. He even asserts that the occasional designs I submit +are late Jacobean, but that isn't fair. They're Post-Romanesque.</p> + +<p>Old N. J. also objects to my penchant for ladies of the +stage and 'vision screen, and periodically threatens to cut my +allowance, though that's supposed to be a salary. It's inconvenient +to be so dependent, and sometimes I regret that unfortunate +market crash of 2009 that wiped out my own money, although +it did keep me from marrying Whimsy White, and van +Manderpootz, through his subjunctivisor, succeeded in proving +that that would have been a catastrophe. But it turned out +nearly as much of a disaster anyway, as far as my feelings were +concerned. It took me months to forget Joanna Caldwell and +her silvery eyes. Just another instance when I was a little late.</p> + +<p>Van Manderpootz himself is my old Physics Professor, head +of the Department of Newer Physics at N. Y. U., and a genius, +but a bit eccentric. Judge for yourself.</p> + +<p>"And that's the thesis," he said suddenly, interrupting my +thoughts.</p> + +<p>"Eh? Oh, of course. But what's that grinning robot got +to do with it?"</p> + +<p>He purpled. "I've just told you!" he roared. "Idiot! Imbecile! +To dream while van Manderpootz talks! Get out! +Get out!"</p> + +<p>I got. It was late anyway, so late that I overslept more than +usual in the morning, and suffered more than the usual lecture +on promptness from my father at the office.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Van Manderpootz had forgotten his anger by the next +time I dropped in for an evening. The robot still stood in the +corner near the window, and I lost no time asking its purpose.</p> + +<p>"It's just a toy I had some of the students construct," he +explained. "There's a screen of photoelectric cells behind the +right eye, so connected that when a certain pattern is thrown +on them, it activates the mechanism. The thing's plugged into +the light-circuit, but it really ought to run on gasoline."</p> + +<p>"Why?"</p> + +<p>"Well, the pattern it's set for is the shape of an automobile. +See here." He picked up a card from his desk, and cut +in the outlines of a streamlined car like those of that year. "Since +only one eye is used," he continued, "The thing can't tell the +difference between a full-sized vehicle at a distance and this +small outline nearby. It has no sense of perspective."</p> + +<p>He held the bit of cardboard before the eye of the mechanism. +Instantly came its roar of "<i>A-a-gh-rasp!</i>" and it leaped +forward a single pace, arms upraised. Van Manderpootz withdrew +the card, and again the thing relapsed stolidly into its +place.</p> + +<p>"What the devil!" I exclaimed. "What's it for?"</p> + +<p>"Does van Manderpootz ever do work without reason back +of it? I use it as a demonstration in my seminar."</p> + +<p>"To demonstrate what?"</p> + +<p>"The power of reason," said van Manderpootz solemnly.</p> + +<p>"How? And why ought it to work on gasoline instead of +electric power?"</p> + +<p>"One question at a time, Dixon. You have missed the +grandeur of van Manderpootz's concept. See here, this creature, +imperfect as it is, represents the predatory machine. It is +the mechanical parallel of the tiger, lurking in its jungle to leap +on living prey. <i>This</i> monster's jungle is the city; its prey is +the unwary machine that follows the trails called streets. Understand?"</p> + +<p>"No."</p> + +<p>"Well, picture this automaton, not as it is, but as van +Manderpootz could make it if he wished. It lurks gigantic in +the shadows of buildings; it creeps stealthily through dark alleys; +it skulks on deserted streets, with its gasoline engine purring +quietly. Then—an unsuspecting automobile flashes its image on +the screen behind its eyes. It leaps. It seizes its prey, swinging +it in steel arms to its steel jaws. Through the metal throat +of its victim crash steel teeth; the blood of its prey—the gasoline, +that is—is drained into its stomach, or its gas-tank. With +renewed strength it flings away the husk and prowls on to seek +other prey. It is the machine-carnivore, the tiger of mechanics."</p> + +<p>I suppose I stared dumbly. It occurred to me suddenly that +the brain of the great van Manderpootz was cracking. "What +the—?" I gasped.</p> + +<p>"That," he said blandly, "is but a concept. I have many +another use for the toy. I can prove anything with it, anything +I wish."</p> + +<p>"You can? Then prove something."</p> + +<p>"Name your proposition, Dixon."</p> + +<p>I hesitated, nonplussed.</p> + +<p>"Come!" he said impatiently. "Look here; I will prove that +anarchy is the ideal government, or that Heaven and Hell are the +same place, or that—"</p> + +<p>"Prove that!" I said. "About Heaven and Hell."</p> + +<p>"Easily. First we will endow my robot with intelligence. I +add a mechanical memory by means of the old Cushman delayed +valve; I add a mathematical sense with any of the calculating +machines; I give it a voice and a vocabulary with the magnetic-impulse +wire phonograph. Now the point I make is this: +Granted an intelligent machine, does it not follow that every +other machine constructed like it must have the identical qualities? +Would not each robot given the same insides have exactly +the same character?"</p> + +<p>"No!" I snapped. "Human beings can't make two machines +exactly alike. There'd be tiny differences; one would react +quicker than others, or one would prefer Fox Airsplitters as +prey, while another reacted most vigorously to Carnecars. In +other words, they'd have—<i>individuality</i>!" I grinned in triumph.</p> + +<p>"My point exactly," observed van Manderpootz. "You +admit, then, that this individuality is the result of imperfect +workmanship. If our means of manufacture were perfect, all +robots would be identical, and this individuality would not exist. +Is that true?"</p> + +<p>"I—suppose so."</p> + +<p>"Then I argue that our own individuality is due to our +falling short of perfection. All of us—even van Manderpootz—are +individuals only because we are not perfect. Were we perfect, +each of us would be exactly like everyone else. True?"</p> + +<p>"Uh—yes."</p> + +<p>"But Heaven, by definition, is a place where all is perfect. +Therefore, in Heaven everybody is exactly like everybody else, +and <i>therefore</i>, everybody is thoroughly and completely bored! +There is no torture like boredom, Dixon, and—Well, have I +proved my point?"</p> + +<p>I was floored. "But—about anarchy, then?" I stammered.</p> + +<p>"Simple. Very simple for van Manderpootz. See here; +with a perfect nation—that is, one whose individuals are all exactly +alike, which I have just proved to constitute perfection—with +a perfect nation, I repeat, laws and government are utterly +superfluous. If everybody reacts to stimuli in the same way, +laws are quite useless, obviously. If, for instance, a certain event +occurred that might lead to a declaration of war, why, everybody +in such a nation would vote for war at the same instant. Therefore +government is unnecessary, and therefore anarchy is the +ideal government, since it is the proper government for a perfect +race." He paused. "I shall now prove that anarchy is <i>not</i> +the ideal government—"</p> + +<p>"Never mind!" I begged. "Who am I to argue with van +Manderpootz? But is <i>that</i> the whole purpose of this dizzy robot? +Just a basis for logic?" The mechanism replied with its +usual rasp as it leaped toward some vagrant car beyond the +window.</p> + +<p>"Isn't that enough?" growled van Manderpootz. "However,"—his +voice dropped—"I have even a greater destiny in +mind. My boy, van Manderpootz has solved the riddle of the +universe!" He paused impressively. "Well, why don't you say +something?"</p> + +<p>"Uh!" I gasped. "It's—uh—marvelous!"</p> + +<p>"Not for van Manderpootz," he said modestly.</p> + +<p>"But—what is it?"</p> + +<p>"Eh—Oh!" He frowned. "Well, I'll tell you, Dixon. You +won't understand, but I'll tell you." He coughed. "As far +back as the early twentieth century," he resumed, "Einstein proved +that energy is particular. Matter is also particular, and now van +Manderpootz adds that space and time are discrete!" He glared +at me.</p> + +<p>"Energy and matter are particular," I murmured, "and space +and time are discrete! How very moral of them!"</p> + +<p>"Imbecile!" he blazed. "To pun on the words of van Manderpootz! +You know very well that I mean particular and +discrete in the physical sense. Matter is composed of particles, +therefore it is particular. The particles of matter are called +electrons, protons, and neutrons, and those of energy, quanta. I +now add two others, the particles of space I call spations, those +of time, chronons."</p> + +<p>"And what in the devil," I asked, "are particles of space +and time?"</p> + +<p>"Just what I said!" snapped van Manderpootz. "Exactly +as the particles of matter are the smallest pieces of matter that +can exist, just as there is no such thing as a half of an electron, +or for that matter, half a quantum, so the chronon is the smallest +possible fragment of time, and the spation the smallest possible +bit of space. Neither time nor space is continuous; each is composed +of these infinitely tiny fragments."</p> + +<p>"Well, how long is a chronon in time? How big is a +spation in space?"</p> + +<p>"Van Manderpootz has even measured that. A chronon is +the length of time it takes one quantum of energy to push one +electron from one electronic orbit to the next. There can obviously +be no shorter interval of time, since an electron is the +smallest unit of matter and the quantum the smallest unit of +energy. And a spation is the exact volume of a proton. Since +nothing smaller exists, that is obviously the smallest unit of +space."</p> + +<p>"Well, look here," I argued. "Then what's in between +these particles of space and time? If time moves, as you say, in +jerks of one chronon each, what's between the jerks?"</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said the great van Manderpootz. "Now we come +to the heart of the matter. In between the particles of space +and time, must obviously be something that is neither space, +time, matter, nor energy. A hundred years ago Shapley anticipated +van Manderpootz in a vague way when he announced his +cosmo-plasma, the great underlying matrix in which time and +space and the universe are embedded. Now van Manderpootz +announces the ultimate unit, the universal particle, the focus in +which matter, energy, time, and space meet, the unit from which +electrons, protons, neutrons, quanta, spations, and chronons are +all constructed. The riddle of the universe is solved by what +I have chosen to name the cosmon." His blue eyes bored into +me.</p> + +<p>"Magnificent!" I said feebly, knowing that some such word +was expected. "But what good is it?"</p> + +<p>"What good is it?" he roared. "It provides—or will provide, +once I work out a few details—the means of turning energy +into time, or space into matter, or time into space, or—" He +sputtered into silence. "Fool!" he muttered. "To think that +you studied under the tutelage of van Manderpootz. I blush; I +actually blush!"</p> + +<p>One couldn't have told it if he were blushing. His face +was always rubicund enough. "Colossal!" I said hastily. "What +a mind!"</p> + +<p>That mollified him. "But that's not all," he proceeded. +"Van Manderpootz never stops short of perfection. I now announce +the unit particle of thought—the psychon!"</p> + +<p>This was a little too much. I simply stared.</p> + +<p>"Well may you be dumbfounded," said van Manderpootz. +"I presume you are aware, by hearsay at least, of the existence of +thought. The psychon, the unit of thought, is one electron plus +one proton, which are bound so as to form one neutron, embedded +in one cosmon, occupying a volume of one spation, driven by +one quantum for a period of one chronon. Very obvious; very +simple."</p> + +<p>"Oh, very!" I echoed. "Even I can see that that equals +one psychon."</p> + +<p>He beamed. "Excellent! Excellent!"</p> + +<p>"And what," I asked, "will you do with the psychons?"</p> + +<p>"Ah," he rumbled. "Now we go even <i>past</i> the heart of the +matter, and return to Isaak here." He jammed a thumb toward +the robot. "Here I will create Roger Bacon's mechanical head. +In the skull of this clumsy creature will rest such intelligence +as not even van Manderpootz—I should say, as <i>only</i> van Manderpootz—can +conceive. It remains merely to construct my +idealizator."</p> + +<p>"Your idealizator?"</p> + +<p>"Of course. Have I not just proven that thoughts are as +real as matter, energy, time, or space? Have I not just demonstrated +that one can be transformed, through the cosmon, into +any other? My idealizator is the means of transforming psychons +to quanta, just as, for instance, a Crookes tube or X-ray +tube transforms matter to electrons. I will make your thoughts +visible! And not your thoughts as they are in that numb brain +of yours, but in <i>ideal</i> form. Do you see? The psychons of your +mind are the same as those from any other mind, just as all +electrons are identical, whether from gold or iron. Yes! Your +psychons"—his voice quavered—"are identical with those from +the mind of—van Manderpootz!" He paused, shaken.</p> + +<p>"Actually?" I gasped.</p> + +<p>"Actually. Fewer in number, of course, but identical. Therefore, +my idealizator shows your thought released from the impress +of your personality. It shows it—ideal!"</p> + +<p>Well, I was late to the office again.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>A week later I thought of van Manderpootz. Tips was on +tour somewhere, and I didn't dare take anyone else out because +I'd tried it once before and she'd heard about it. So, with nothing +to do, I finally dropped around to the professor's quarter, +found him missing, and eventually located him in his laboratory +at the Physics Building. He was puttering around the table +that had once held that damned subjunctivisor of his, but now +it supported an indescribable mess of tubes and tangled wires, +and as its most striking feature, a circular plane mirror etched +with a grating of delicately scratched lines.</p> + +<p>"Good evening, Dixon," he rumbled.</p> + +<p>I echoed his greeting. "What's that?" I asked.</p> + +<p>"My idealizator. A rough model, much too clumsy to fit +into Isaak's iron skull. I'm just finishing it to try it out." He +turned glittering blue eyes on me. "How fortunate that you're +here. It will save the world a terrible risk."</p> + +<p>"A risk?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. It is obvious that too long an exposure to the device +will extract too many psychons, and leave the subject's mind in +a sort of moronic condition. I was about to accept the risk, +but I see now that it would be woefully unfair to the world to +endanger the mind of van Manderpootz. But you are at hand, +and will do very well."</p> + +<p>"Oh, no I won't!"</p> + +<p>"Come, come!" he said, frowning. "The danger is negligible. +In fact, I doubt whether the device will be able to extract <i>any</i> +psychons from <i>your</i> mind. At any rate, you will be perfectly +safe for a period of at least half an hour. I, with a vastly more +productive mind, could doubtless stand the strain indefinitely, +but my responsibility to the world is too great to chance it until +I have tested the machine on someone else. You should be +proud of the honor."</p> + +<p>"Well, I'm not!" But my protest was feeble, and after +all, despite his overbearing mannerisms, I knew van Manderpootz +liked me, and I was positive he would not have exposed +me to any real danger. In the end I found myself seated before +the table facing the etched mirror.</p> + +<p>"Put your face against the barrel," said van Manderpootz, +indicating a stove-pipe-like tube. "That's merely to cut off extraneous +sights, so that you can see only the mirror. Go ahead, +I tell you! It's no more than the barrel of a telescope or +microscope."</p> + +<p>I complied. "Now what?" I asked.</p> + +<p>"What do you see?"</p> + +<p>"My own face in the mirror."</p> + +<p>"Of course. Now I start the reflector rotating." There was +a faint whir, and the mirror was spinning smoothly, still with +only a slightly blurred image of myself. "Listen, now," continued +van Manderpootz. "Here is what you are to do. You +will think of a generic noun. 'House,' for instance. If you think +of house, you will see, not an individual house, but your ideal +house, the house of all your dreams and desires. If you think +of a horse, you will see what your mind conceives as the perfect +horse, such a horse as dream and longing create. Do you understand? +Have you chosen a topic?"</p> + +<p>"Yes." After all, I was only twenty-eight; the noun I had +chosen was—girl.</p> + +<p>"Good," said the professor. "I turn on the current."</p> + +<p>There was a blue radiance behind the mirror. My own face +still stared back at me from the spinning surface, but something +was forming behind it, building up, growing. I blinked; when +I focused my eyes again, it was—<i>she</i> was—there.</p> + +<p>Lord! I can't begin to describe her. I don't even know +if I saw her clearly the first time. It was like looking into +another world and seeing the embodiment of all longings, +dreams, aspirations, and ideals. It was so poignant a sensation +that it crossed the borderline into pain. It was—well, exquisite +torture or agonized delight. It was at once unbearable and +irresistible.</p> + +<p>But I gazed. I had to. There was a haunting familiarity +about the impossibly beautiful features. I had seen the face—somewhere—sometime. +In dreams? No; I realized suddenly +what was the source of that familiarity. This was no living woman, +but a synthesis. Her nose was the tiny, impudent one of +Whimsy White at her loveliest moment; her lips were the perfect +bow of Tips Alva; her silvery eyes and dusky velvet hair +were those of Joan Caldwell. But the aggregate, the sum total, +the face in the mirror—that was none of these; it was a face +impossibly, incredibly, outrageously beautiful.</p> + +<p>Only her face and throat were visible, and the features were +cool, expressionless, and still as a carving. I wandered suddenly +if she could smile, and with the thought, she did. If she had +been beautiful before, now her beauty flamed to such a pitch +that it was—well, insolent; it was an affront to be so lovely; it +was insulting. I felt a wild surge of anger that the image before +me should flaunt such beauty, and yet be—<i>non-existent</i>! It was +deception, cheating, fraud, a promise that could never be fulfilled.</p> + +<p>Anger died in the depths of that fascination. I wondered +what the rest of her was like, and instantly she moved gracefully +back until her full figure was visible. I must be a prude at heart, +for she wasn't wearing the usual cuirass-and-shorts of that year, +but an iridescent four-paneled costume that all but concealed +her dainty knees. But her form was slim and erect as a column +of cigarette smoke in still air, and I knew that she could dance +like a fragment of mist on water. And with that thought she +did move, dropping in a low curtsy, and looking up with the +faintest possible flush crimsoning the curve of her throat. Yes, +I must be a prude at heart; despite Tips Alva and Whimsy +White and the rest, my ideal was modest.</p> + +<p>It was unbelievable that the mirror was simply giving back +my thoughts. She seemed as real as myself, and—after all—I +guess she was. As real as myself, no more, no less, because she +was part of my own mind. And at this point I realized that van +Manderpootz was shaking me and bellowing, "Your time's up. +Come out of it! Your half-hour's up!"</p> + +<p>He must have switched off the current. The image faded, +and I took my face from the tube, dropping it on my arms.</p> + +<p>"O-o-o-o-o-oh!" I groaned.</p> + +<p>"How do you feel?" he snapped.</p> + +<p>"Feel? All right—physically." I looked up.</p> + +<p>Concern flickered in his blue eyes. "What's the cube root +of 4913?" he crackled sharply.</p> + +<p>I've always been quick at figures. "It's—uh—17," I returned +dully. "Why the devil—?"</p> + +<p>"You're all right mentally," he announced. "Now—why +were you sitting there like a dummy for half an hour? My idealizator +must have worked, as is only natural for a van Manderpootz +creation, but what were you thinking of?"</p> + +<p>"I thought—I thought of 'girl'," I groaned.</p> + +<p>He snorted. "Hah! You would, you idiot! 'House' or +'horse' wasn't good enough; you had to pick something with +emotional connotations. Well, you can start right in forgetting +her, because she doesn't exist."</p> + +<p>I couldn't give up hope, as easily as that. "But can't you—can't +you—?" I didn't even know what I meant to ask.</p> + +<p>"Van Manderpootz," he announced, "is a mathematician, +not a magician. Do you expect me to materialize an ideal for +you?" When I had no reply but a groan, he continued. "Now +I think it safe enough to try the device myself. I shall take—let's +see—the thought 'man.' I shall see what the superman +looks like, since the ideal of van Manderpootz can be nothing +less than superman." He seated himself. "Turn that switch," +he said. "Now!"</p> + +<p>I did. The tubes glowed into low blue light. I watched +dully, disinterestedly; nothing held any attraction for me after +that image of the ideal.</p> + +<p>"Huh!" said van Manderpootz suddenly. "Turn it on, I +say! I see nothing but my own reflection."</p> + +<p>I stared, then burst into a hollow laugh. The mirror was +spinning; the banks of tubes were glowing; the device was +operating.</p> + +<p>Van Manderpootz raised his face, a little redder than usual. +I laughed half hysterically. "After all," he said huffily, "one +might have a lower ideal of man than van Manderpootz. I see +nothing nearly so humorous as your situation."</p> + +<p>The laughter died. I went miserably home, spent half the +remainder of the night in morose contemplation, smoked nearly +two packs of cigarettes, and didn't get to the office at all the +next day.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Tips Alva got back to town for a week-end broadcast, but +I didn't even bother to see her, just phoned her and told her I +was sick. I guess my face lent credibility to the story, for she +was duly sympathetic, and her face in the phone screen was +quite anxious. Even at that, I couldn't keep my eyes away from +her lips because, except for a bit too lustrous make-up, they +were the lips of the ideal. But they weren't enough; they just +weren't enough.</p> + +<p>Old N. J. began to worry again. I couldn't sleep late of +mornings any more, and after missing that one day, I kept getting +down earlier and earlier until one morning I was only ten minutes +late. He called me in at once.</p> + +<p>"Look here, Dixon," he said. "Have you been to a doctor +recently?"</p> + +<p>"I'm not sick," I said listlessly.</p> + +<p>"Then for Heaven's sake, marry the girl! I don't care what +chorus she kicks in, marry her and act like a human being again."</p> + +<p>"I—can't."</p> + +<p>"Oh. She's already married, eh?"</p> + +<p>Well, I couldn't tell him she didn't exist. I couldn't say +I was in love with a vision, a dream, an ideal. He thought I +was a little crazy, anyway, so I just muttered "Yeah," and didn't +argue when he said gruffly: "Then you'll get over it. Take a +vacation. Take <i>two</i> vacations. You might as well for all the +good you are around here."</p> + +<p>I didn't leave New York; I lacked the energy. I just mooned +around the city for a while, avoiding my friends, and dreaming +of the impossible beauty of the face in the mirror. And by and +by the longing to see that vision of perfection once more began +to become overpowering. I don't suppose anyone except me +can understand the lure of that memory; the face, you see, had +been my ideal, my concept of perfection. One sees beautiful +women here and there in the world; one falls in love, but always, +no matter how great their beauty or how deep one's love, they +fall short in some degree of the secret vision of the ideal. But +not the mirrored face; she was my ideal, and therefore, whatever +imperfections she might have had in the minds of others, +in my eyes she had none. None, that is, save the terrible one +of being only an ideal, and therefore unattainable—but that is +a fault inherent in all perfection.</p> + +<p>It was a matter of days before I yielded. Common sense +told me it was futile, even foolhardy, to gaze again on the vision +of perfect desirability. I fought against the hunger, but I fought +hopelessly, and was not at all surprised to find myself one evening +rapping on van Manderpootz's door in the University Club. +He wasn't there; I'd been hoping he wouldn't be, since it gave +me an excuse to seek him in his laboratory in the Physics Building, +to which I would have dragged him anyway.</p> + +<p>There I found him, writing some sort of notations on the +table that held the idealizator. "Hello, Dixon," he said. "Did +it ever occur to you that the ideal university cannot exist? +Naturally not since it must be composed of perfect students and +perfect educators, in which case the former could have nothing +to learn and the latter, therefore, nothing to teach."</p> + +<p>What interest had I in the perfect university and its inability +to exist? My whole being was desolate over the non-existence +of another ideal. "Professor," I said tensely, "may I use that—that +thing of yours again? I want to—uh—see something."</p> + +<p>My voice must have disclosed the situation, for van Manderpootz +looked up sharply. "So!" he snapped. "So you disregarded +my advice! Forget her, I said. Forget her because +she doesn't exist."</p> + +<p>"But—I can't! Once more, Professor—only once more!"</p> + +<p>He shrugged, but his blue, metallic eyes were a little softer +than usual. After all, for some inconceivable reason, he likes me. +"Well, Dixon," he said, "you're of age and supposed to be of +mature intelligence. I tell you that this is a very stupid request, +and van Manderpootz always knows what he's talking +about. If you want to stupefy yourself with the opium of impossible +dreams, go ahead. This is the last chance you'll have, +for tomorrow the idealizator of van Manderpootz goes into the +Bacon head of Isaak there. I shall shift the oscillators so that +the psychons, instead of becoming light quanta, emerge as an +electron flow—a current which will actuate Isaak's vocal apparatus +and come out as speech." He paused musingly. "Van +Manderpootz will hear the voice of the ideal. Of course Isaak +can return only what psychons he receives from the brain of +the operator, but just as the image in the mirror, the thoughts +will have lost their human impress, and the words will be those +of an ideal." He perceived that I wasn't listening, I suppose. +"Go ahead, imbecile!" he grunted.</p> + +<p>I did. The glory that I hungered after flamed slowly into +being, incredible in loveliness, and somehow, unbelievably, even +more beautiful than on that other occasion. I know why now; +long afterwards, van Manderpootz explained that the very fact +that I had seen an ideal once before had altered my ideal, raised +it to a higher level. With that face among my memories, my concept +of perfection was different than it had been.</p> + +<p>So I gazed and hungered. Readily and instantly the being +in the mirror responded to my thoughts with smile and movement. +When I thought of love, her eyes blazed with such tenderness +that it seemed as if—I—I, Dixon Wells—were part of +those pairs who had made the great romances of the world, +Heloise and Abelard, Tristram and Isolde, Aucassin and Nicolette. +It was like the thrust of a dagger to feel van Manderpootz +shaking me, to hear his gruff voice calling, "Out of it! Out of +it! Time's up."</p> + +<p>I groaned and dropped my face on my hands. The Professor +had been right, of course; this insane repetition had only +intensified an unfulfillable longing, and had made a bad mess +ten times as bad. Then I heard him muttering behind me. +"Strange!" he murmured. "In fact, fantastic. Oedipus—oedipus +of the magazine covers and billboards."</p> + +<p>I looked dully around. He was standing behind me, squinting, +apparently, into the spinning mirror beyond the end of the +black tube. "Huh?" I grunted wearily.</p> + +<p>"That face," he said. "Very queer. You must have seen +her features on a hundred magazines, on a thousand billboards, +on countless 'vision broadcasts. The oedipus complex in a curious +form."</p> + +<p>"Eh? Could <i>you</i> see her?"</p> + +<p>"Of course!" he grunted. "Didn't I say a dozen times that +the psychons are transmuted to perfectly ordinary quanta of +visible light? If you could see her, why not I?"</p> + +<p>"But—what about billboards and all?"</p> + +<p>"That face," said the professor slowly. "It's somewhat +idealized, of course, and certain details are wrong. Her eyes +aren't that pallid silver-blue you imagined; they're green—sea-green, +emerald colored."</p> + +<p>"What the devil," I asked hoarsely, "are you talking about?"</p> + +<p>"About the face in the mirror. It happens to be, Dixon, +a close approximation of the features of de Lisle d'Agrion, the +Dragon Fly!"</p> + +<p>"You mean—she's real? She exists? She lives? She—"</p> + +<p>"Wait a moment, Dixon. She's real enough, but in accordance +with your habit, you're a little late. About twenty-five +years too late, I should say. She must now be somewhere +in the fifties—let's see—fifty-three, I think. But during your +very early childhood, you must have seen her face pictured everywhere, +de Lisle d'Agrion, the Dragon Fly."</p> + +<p>I could only gulp. That blow was devastating.</p> + +<p>"You see," continued van Manderpootz, "one's ideals are +implanted very early. That's why you continually fall in love +with girls who possess one or another feature that reminds you +of her, her hair, her nose, her mouth, her eyes. Very simple, +but rather curious."</p> + +<p>"Curious!" I blazed. "Curious, you say! Everytime I +look into one of your damned contraptions I find myself in +love with a myth! A girl who's dead, or married, or unreal, or +turned into an old woman! Curious, eh? Damned funny, isn't it?"</p> + +<p>"Just a moment," said the professor placidly. "It happens, +Dixon, that she has a daughter. What's more, Denise resembles +her mother. And what's still more, she's arriving in New York +next week to study American letters at the University here. She +writes, you see."</p> + +<p>That was too much for immediate comprehension. "How—how +do you know?" I gasped.</p> + +<p>It was one of the few times I have seen the colossal blandness +of van Manderpootz ruffled. He reddened a trifle, and +said slowly, "It also happens, Dixon, that many years ago in +Amsterdam, Haskel van Manderpootz and de Lisle d'Agrion +were—very friendly—more than friendly, I might say, but for +the fact that two such powerful personalities as the Dragon Fly +and van Manderpootz were always at odds." He frowned. "I +was almost her second husband. She's had seven, I believe; +Denise is the daughter of her third."</p> + +<p>"Why—why is she coming here?"</p> + +<p>"Because," he said with dignity, "van Manderpootz is here. +I am still a friend of de Lisle's." He turned and bent over the +complex device on the table. "Hand me that wrench," he +ordered. "Tonight I dismantle this, and tomorrow start reconstructing +it for Isaak's head."</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>But when, the following week, I rushed eagerly back to +van Manderpootz's laboratory, the idealizator was still in place. +The professor greeted me with a humorous twist to what was +visible of his bearded mouth. "Yes, it's still here," he said, +gesturing at the device. "I've decided to build an entirely new +one for Isaak, and besides, this one has afforded me considerable +amusement. Furthermore, in the words of Oscar Wilde, +who am I to tamper with a work of genius. After all, the +mechanism is the product of the great van Manderpootz."</p> + +<p>He was deliberately tantalizing me. He knew that I hadn't +come to hear him discourse on Isaak, or even on the incomparable +van Manderpootz. Then he smiled and softened, and +turned to the little inner office adjacent, the room where Isaak +stood in metal austerity. "Denise!" he called, "come here."</p> + +<p>I don't know exactly what I expected, but I do know that +the breath left me as the girl entered. She wasn't exactly my +image of the ideal, of course; she was perhaps the merest +trifle slimmer, and her eyes—well, they must have been much +like those of de Lisle d'Agrion, for they were the clearest emerald +I've ever seen. They were impudently direct eyes, and I could +imagine why van Manderpootz and the Dragon Fly might have +been forever quarreling; that was easy to imagine, looking into +the eyes of the Dragon Fly's daughter.</p> + +<p>Nor was Denise, apparently, quite as femininely modest as +my image of perfection. She wore the extremely unconcealing +costume of the day, which covered, I suppose, about as much +of her as one of the one-piece swimming suits of the middle +years of the twentieth century. She gave an impression, not so +much of fleeting grace as of litheness and supple strength, an +air of independence, frankness, and—I say it again—impudence.</p> + +<p>"Well!" she said coolly as van Manderpootz presented me. +"So you're the scion of the N. J. Wells Corporation. Every +now and then your escapades enliven the Paris Sunday supplements. +Wasn't it you who snared a million dollars in the market +so you could ask Whimsy White—?"</p> + +<p>I flushed. "That was greatly exaggerated," I said hastily, +"and anyway I lost it before we—uh—before I—"</p> + +<p>"Not before you made somewhat of a fool of yourself, I +believe," she finished sweetly.</p> + +<p>Well, that's the sort she was. If she hadn't been so infernally +lovely, if she hadn't looked so much like the face in +the mirror, I'd have flared up, said "Pleased to have met you," +and never have seen her again. But I couldn't get angry, not +when she had the dusky hair, the perfect lips, the saucy nose of +the being who to me was ideal.</p> + +<p>So I did see her again, and several times again. In fact, +I suppose I occupied most of her time between the few literary +courses she was taking, and little by little I began to see that +in other respects besides the physical she was not so far from +my ideal. Beneath her impudence was honesty, and frankness, +and, despite herself, sweetness, so that even allowing for the +head-start I'd had, I fell in love pretty hastily. And what's more, +I knew she was beginning to reciprocate.</p> + +<p>That was the situation when I called for her one noon and +took her over to van Manderpootz's laboratory. We were to +lunch with him at the University Club, but we found him occupied +in directing some experiment in the big laboratory beyond +his personal one, untangling some sort of mess that his +staff had blundered into. So Denise and I wandered back into +the smaller room, perfectly content to be alone together. I +simply couldn't feel hungry in her presence; just talking to her +was enough of a substitute for food.</p> + +<p>"I'm going to be a good writer," she was saying musingly. +"Some day, Dick, I'm going to be famous."</p> + +<p>Well, everyone knows how correct that prediction was. I +agreed with her instantly.</p> + +<p>She smiled. "You're nice, Dick," she said. "Very nice."</p> + +<p>"Very?"</p> + +<p>"<i>Very!</i>" she said emphatically. Then her green eyes strayed +over to the table that held the idealizator. "What crack-brained +contraption of Uncle Haskel's is that?" she asked.</p> + +<p>I explained, rather inaccurately, I'm afraid, but no ordinary +engineer can follow the ramifications of a van Manderpootz conception. +Nevertheless, Denise caught the gist of it and her +eyes glowed emerald fire.</p> + +<p>"It's fascinating!" she exclaimed. She rose and moved over +to the table. "I'm going to try it."</p> + +<p>"Not without the professor, you won't! It might be +dangerous."</p> + +<p>That was the wrong thing to say. The green eyes glowed +brighter as she cast me a whimsical glance. "But I am," she +said. "Dick, I'm going to—see my ideal man!" She laughed +softly.</p> + +<p>I was panicky. Suppose her ideal turned out tall and dark +and powerful, instead of short and sandy-haired and a bit—well, +chubby, as I am. "No!" I said vehemently. "I won't let you!"</p> + +<p>She laughed again. I suppose she read my consternation, +for she said softly, "Don't be silly, Dick." She sat down, placed +her face against the opening of the barrel, and commanded. +"Turn it on."</p> + +<p>I couldn't refuse her. I set the mirror whirling, then +switched on the bank of tubes. Then immediately I stepped +behind her, squinting into what was visible of the flashing +mirror, where a face was forming, slowly—vaguely.</p> + +<p>I thrilled. Surely the hair of the image was sandy. I even +fancied now that I could trace a resemblance to my own features. +Perhaps Denise sensed something similar, for she suddenly +withdrew her eyes from the tube and looked up with a +faintly embarrassed flush, a thing most unusual for her.</p> + +<p>"Ideals are dull!" she said. "I want a real thrill. Do you +know what I'm going to see? I'm going to visualize ideal horror. +That's what I'll do. I'm going to see absolute horror!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, no you're not!" I gasped. "That's a terribly dangerous +idea." Off in the other room I heard the voice of van +Manderpootz, "Dixon!"</p> + +<p>"Dangerous—bosh!" Denise retorted. "I'm a writer, Dick. +All this means to me is material. It's just experience, and I +want it."</p> + +<p>Van Manderpootz again. "Dixon! Dixon! Come here." +I said, "Listen, Denise. I'll be right back. Don't try anything +until I'm here—please!"</p> + +<p>I dashed into the big laboratory. Van Manderpootz was +facing a cowed group of assistants, quite apparently in extreme +awe of the great man.</p> + +<p>"Hah, Dixon!" he rasped. "Tell these fools what an Emmerich +valve is, and why it won't operate in a free electronic +stream. Let 'em see that even an ordinary engineer knows +that much."</p> + +<p>Well, an ordinary engineer doesn't, but it happened that I +did. Not that I'm particularly exceptional as an engineer, but I +<i>did</i> happen to know that because a year or two before I'd done +some work on the big tidal turbines up in Maine, where they +have to use Emmerich valves to guard against electrical leakage +from the tremendous potentials in their condensers. So I started +explaining, and van Manderpootz kept interpolating sarcasms +about his staff, and when I finally finished, I suppose I'd been +in there about half an hour. And then—I remembered Denise!</p> + +<p>I left van Manderpootz staring as I rushed back, and sure +enough, there was the girl with her face pressed against the +barrel, and her hands gripping the table edge. Her features +were hidden, of course, but there was something about her +strained position, her white knuckles—</p> + +<p>"Denise!" I yelled. "Are you all right? <i>Denise!</i>"</p> + +<p>She didn't move. I stuck my face in between the mirror +and the end of the barrel and peered up the tube at her visage, +and what I saw left me all but stunned. Have you ever seen +stark, mad, infinite terror on a human face? That was what I +saw in Denise's—inexpressible, unbearable horror, worse than +the fear of death could ever be. Her green eyes were widened +so that the whites showed around them; her perfect lips were +contorted, her whole face strained into a mask of sheer terror.</p> + +<p>I rushed for the switch, but in passing I caught a single +glimpse of—of what showed in the mirror. Incredible! Obscene, +terror-laden, horrifying things—there just aren't words for them. +There are no words.</p> + +<p>Denise didn't move as the tubes darkened. I raised her face +from the barrel and when she glimpsed me she moved. She +flung herself out of that chair and away, facing me with such mad +terror that I halted.</p> + +<p>"Denise!" I cried. "It's just Dick. Look, Denise!"</p> + +<p>But as I moved toward her, she uttered a choking scream, +her eyes dulled, her knees gave, and she fainted. Whatever she +had seen, it must have been appalling to the uttermost, for +Denise was not the sort to faint.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>It was a week later that I sat facing van Manderpootz in his +little inner office. The grey metal figure of Isaak was missing, +and the table that had held the idealizator was empty.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said van Manderpootz. "I've dismantled it. One +of van Manderpootz's few mistakes was to leave it around where +a pair of incompetents like you and Denise could get to it. It +seems that I continually overestimate the intelligence of others. +I suppose I tend to judge them by the brain of van +Manderpootz."</p> + +<p>I said nothing. I was thoroughly disheartened and depressed, +and whatever the professor said about my lack of intelligence, +I felt it justified.</p> + +<p>"Hereafter," resumed van Manderpootz, "I shall credit nobody +except myself with intelligence, and will doubtless be +much more nearly correct." He waved a hand at Isaak's vacant +corner. "Not even the Bacon head," he continued. "I've +abandoned that project, because, when you come right down to +it, what need has the world of a mechanical brain when it already +has that of van Manderpootz?"</p> + +<p>"Professor," I burst out suddenly, "why won't they let me +see Denise? I've been at the hospital every day, and they let +me into her room just once—just once, and that time she went +right into a fit of hysterics. Why? Is she—?" I gulped.</p> + +<p>"She's recovering nicely, Dixon."</p> + +<p>"Then why can't I see her?"</p> + +<p>"Well," said van Manderpootz placidly, "it's like this. You +see, when you rushed into the laboratory there, you made the +mistake of pushing your face in front of the barrel. She saw +your features right in the midst of all those horrors she had called +up. Do you see? From then on your face was associated in +her mind with the whole hell's brew in the mirror. She can't +even look at you without seeing all of it again."</p> + +<p>"<i>Good—God!</i>" I gasped. "But she'll get over it, won't +she? She'll forget that part of it?"</p> + +<p>"The young psychiatrist who attends her—a bright chap, +by the way, with a number of my own ideas—believes she'll be +quite over it in a couple of months. But personally, Dixon, I +don't think she'll ever welcome the sight of your face, though I +myself have seen uglier visages somewhere or other."</p> + +<p>I ignored that. "Lord!" I groaned. "What a mess!" I +rose to depart, and then—then I knew what inspiration means!</p> + +<p>"Listen!" I said, spinning back. "Listen, professor! Why +can't you get her back here and let her visualize the ideally +beautiful? And then I'll—I'll stick my face into that!" Enthusiasm +grew. "It can't fail!" I cried. "At the worst, it'll +cancel that other memory. It's marvelous!"</p> + +<p>"But as usual," said van Manderpootz, "a little late."</p> + +<p>"Late? Why? You can put up your idealizator again. +You'd do that much, wouldn't you?"</p> + +<p>"Van Manderpootz," he observed, "is the very soul of generosity. +I'd do it gladly, but it's still a little late, Dixon. You +see, she married the bright young psychiatrist this noon."</p> + +<p>Well, I've a date with Tips Alva tonight, and I'm going +to be late for it, just as late as I please. And then I'm going to +do nothing but stare at her lips all evening.</p> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Ideal, by Stanley Grauman Weinbaum + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE IDEAL *** + +***** This file should be named 22897-h.htm or 22897-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/2/8/9/22897/ + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Stephen Blundell and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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