Chapter I · II

Were I asked what your book teaches and what it treats of, I should answer without hesitation: it teaches nothing, and it treats of nothing and of everything. It is the work of an artist, a work of diversion, of pure imagination. What does a trinket, a cameo, an enamel, a painting, or a finely carved goblet teach or treat of?

There is, nevertheless, a notable difference between any sculpture, painting, trinket, and even music, and any work of art whose material is the word. Marble, bronze, and musical tone may well, by subtle interpretation, convey something of themselves; but the word not only can signify, but inevitably signifies ideas, feelings, beliefs, doctrines, and the whole realm of human thought. Nothing is more feasible, to my mind (perhaps because I am not overly acute), than a beautiful statue, a graceful ornament, or an exquisite painting devoid of transcendence or symbols; but how can one write a tale or verses without revealing what the author denies, what he affirms, what he thinks, and what he feels? In all the arts, thought passes with form from the artist’s mind into the substance or matter of the art; but in the art of words, in addition to the thought that art impresses upon form, the very substance or material of the artist is thought as well, and an artist’s thought. The only material external to the artist is the Dictionary, along with the grammatical rules governing the combinations of words; but since neither words nor combinations of words can exist without meaning, it follows that in poetry and in prose, both matter and form are the creation of the writer or poet: only the empty signs, abstracting from what is signified, remain outside him, so to speak.

In this way it is explained how, although your book is a diversion with no design to teach anything, the author’s tendencies and thoughts on the most transcendental questions are plainly evident within it. And it is only fair that we confess those thoughts to be neither very edifying nor very comforting.

Empirical science and observation have classified all that exists and drawn up a skillful inventory of it. Historical criticism, linguistics, and the study of the strata that form the earth’s crust have brought to light a great deal of past human deeds once unknown; of the celestial bodies shining in the expanse of the ether we know an immense amount; the world of the imperceptibly small has been disclosed to us by virtue of the microscope; we have discovered how many eyes this insect possesses and how many little feet that other has: we know already of what elements organic tissues, animal blood, and plant sap are composed: we have harnessed forces that once escaped human power, such as electricity; and thanks to statistics, we keep a meticulous reckoning of how much is brought forth and how much is devoured; and if it is not yet known, it is to be hoped that we shall soon know the precise count of the loaves, the wine, and the meat that humanity eats and drinks day by day.

There is no need to consult profound sages: any mediocre, commonplace scholar of our age nowadays knows, classifies, and orders the phenomena that strike the bodily senses, aided as these senses are by powerful instruments that amplify their perceptual range. Furthermore, through patience, sharpness of mind, and the power of dialectics and mathematics, a great number of laws governing those phenomena have been discovered.

It is natural that mankind should have grown proud over such momentous discoveries and inventions; yet, not only around and outside the sphere of the known, circumscribing it, but also filling it in what is essential and substantial, there remains an unexplored infinity, a dense and impenetrable darkness that seems all the gloomier by the very contrast with the light that science has shed upon the small sum of things it knows. Formerly, whether religions with their dogmas accepted by faith, or metaphysical speculation with the gigantic apparatus of its brilliant systems, cloaked that unknowable immensity, or explained and made it known after their own fashion. Today the prevailing endeavor is to dispense with both metaphysics and religion. The abyss of the unknowable thus lies uncovered and open, drawing us near, filling us with vertigo, and imparting to us the impulse, at times irresistible, to hurl ourselves into it.

The situation, nevertheless, is not uncomfortable for sensible people of some education and standing. They dispense with the transcendent and the supernatural so as not to trouble their heads or waste their time in vain. This inclination frees them from many apprehensions and a certain fear, although at times it inspires in them another, more vexing fear and disquiet: how are the masses, the needy, the hungry, and the ignorant to be restrained without that curb which the enlightened have cast aside with such relish? Apart from this anxiety experienced by some sensible minds, in everything else they see only cause for satisfaction and congratulations.

The foolish, on the other hand, cannot rest content with the enjoyment of the world, however adorned by human industry and invention, nor with what is known, nor with what is manufactured, and they yearn to discover and enjoy still more.

The whole of beings, the Universe, everything that sight and hearing can perceive, has been, as an idea, methodically arranged upon a set of shelves or cubbyholes for better understanding; yet neither this scientific order nor the natural order, as the foolish perceive it, satisfies them. The luxury and pampering of modern life have made them exceedingly hard to please.

And so, neither of the world as it is, nor of the world as we conceive it, do they form a very favorable opinion. Flaws are discovered in everything, and men no longer repeat what God is said to have declared: That it was all good. People hasten more frequently than ever to proclaim that everything is evil; and instead of attributing the work to an all-wise and supreme creator, they suppose it to be the handiwork of an unconscious drive to fashion things residing ab eterno in the atoms, of which no one knows for certain what they may be either.

The two chief results of all this in the literature of current fashion are:

First, that God is suppressed or mentioned only to insult Him, whether with curses and blasphemies, or with mockery and sarcasm.

And second, that in this dark and unknowable infinity, the imagination perceives—just as in the ether it perceives nebulae or stellar nurseries—fragments and ruins of dead faiths, with which it strives to fashion something resembling an essay of new beliefs and revived mythologies.

These two traits are stamped upon your little volume: pessimism, as the conclusion to every description of what we know, and the potent, luxuriant creation of fantastic beings, summoned or drawn forth from the gloom of the unknowable, where the ruins of shattered beliefs and ancient superstitions wander.

Now it will be fitting for me to cite examples and prove that your book contains, with remarkable elegance, all that I contend; but that calls for a second letter.