Anthem quotes

It is a sin to write this.

It is a sin to think words no others think and to put them down upon a paper no others are to see. It is base and evil. It is as if we were speaking alone to no ears but our own.

It is a sin to think words no others think and to put them down upon a paper no others are to see. It is base and evil. It is as if we were speaking alone to no ears but our own.

And we know well that there is no transgression blacker than to do or think alone.

We have broken the laws. The laws say that men may not write unless the Council of Vocations bid them so. May we be forgiven!

It is dark here. The flame of the candle stands still in the air. Nothing moves in this tunnel save our hand on the paper. We are alone here under the earth.

It is a fearful word, alone.

The laws say that none among men may be alone, ever and at any time, for this is the great transgression and the root of all evil. But we have broken many laws.

But this matters not. It matters only that the light is precious and we should not waste it to write when we need it for that work which is our crime.

Nothing matters save the work, our secret, our evil, our precious work.

Still, we must also write, for—may the Council have mercy upon us!—we wish to speak for once to no ears but our own.

Before we removed our garments, we stood in the great sleeping hall, and we raised our right arms, and we said all together with the three Teachers at the head:

“We are nothing. Mankind is all. By the grace of our brothers are we allowed our lives. We exist through, by and for our brothers who are the State. Amen.”

Then we slept. The sleeping halls were white and clean and bare of all things save one hundred beds.

It was not that the learning was too hard for us. It was that the learning was too easy. This is a great sin, to be born with a head which is too quick.

It is not good to be different from our brothers, but it is evil to be superior to them.

The Teachers told us so, and they frowned when they looked upon us.

And they answered: “Since the Council does not know of this hole, there can be no law permitting to enter it.

And everything which is not permitted by law is forbidden.

”

“The will of the Council is above all things, for it is the will of our brothers, which is holy. But if you wish it so, we shall obey you.

Rather shall we be evil with you than good with all our brothers.

May the Council have mercy upon both our hearts!”

We have solved secrets of which the Scholars have no knowledge. We have come to see how great is the unexplored, and many lifetimes will not bring us to the end of our quest. But we wish no end to our quest.

We wish nothing, save to be alone and to learn, and to feel as if with each day our sight were growing sharper than the hawk’s and clearer than rock crystal.

Strange are the ways of evil. We are false in the faces of our brothers. We are defying the will of our Councils.

But we feel no burden upon our spirit and no fear in our heart. And it seems to us that our spirit is clear as a lake troubled by no eyes save those of the sun.

And in our heart—strange are the ways of evil!—in our heart there is the first peace we have known in twenty years.

Their face did not move and they did not avert their eyes. Only their eyes grew wider, and there was triumph in their eyes, and it was not triumph over us, but over things we could not guess.

“You are not one of our brothers, Equality 7-2521, for we do not wish you to be.”

We cannot say what they meant, for there are no words for their meaning, but we know it without words and we knew it then.

There is fear hanging in the air of the sleeping halls, and in the air of the streets.

Fear walks through the City, fear without name, without shape.

All men feel it and none dare to speak.

For we matter not and it must not matter to us whether we live or die, which is to be as our brothers will it. But we, Equality 7-2521, are glad to be living.

If this is a vice, then we wish no virtue.

Yet our brothers are not like us. All is not well with our brothers.

And it seemed as if these eyes were begging us to gather that word and not to let it go from us and from the earth. But the flames rose and we could not guess the word....

What—even if we have to burn for it like the Saint of the Pyre—what is the Unspeakable Word?

The Council of Scholars has said that we all know the things which exist and therefore the things which are not known by all do not exist. But we think that the Council of Scholars is blind.

The secrets of this earth are not for all men to see, but only for those who will seek them.

We know, for we have found a secret unknown to all our brothers.

“Our dearest one,” we whispered.

Never have men said this to women.

The head of the Golden One bowed slowly, and they stood still before us, their arms at their sides, the palms of their hands turned to us, as if their body were delivered in submission to our eyes. And we could not speak.

They would see nothing, save our crime of working alone, and they would destroy us and our light. We care not about our body, but our light is...

Yes, we do care. For the first time do we care about our body.

For this wire is as a part of our body, as a vein torn from us, glowing with our blood. Are we proud of this thread of metal, or of our hands which made it, or is there a line to divide these two?

“So you think that you have found a new power,” said Collective 0-0009. “Do all your brothers think that?”

“What is not thought by all men cannot be true,” said Collective 0-0009.

“You have worked on this alone?” asked International 1-5537.

If that which we have found is the corruption of solitude, then what can men wish for save corruption? If this is the great evil of being alone, then what is good and what is evil?

Everything which comes from the many is good. Everything which comes from one is evil.

This have we been taught with our first breath. We have broken the law, but we have never doubted it. Yet now, as we walk through the forest, we are learning to doubt.

They were silent, then they spoke slowly, and their words were halting, like the words of a child learning to speak for the first time:

“We are one... alone... and only... and we love you who are one... alone... and only.”

We looked into each other’s eyes and we knew that the breath of a miracle had touched us, and fled, and left us groping vainly.

I am. I think. I will.

My hands... My spirit... My sky... My forest... This earth of mine.... What must I say besides? These are the words. This is the answer.

I wished to know the meaning of things. I am the meaning. I wished to find a warrant for being. I need no warrant for being, and no word of sanction upon my being.

I am the warrant and the sanction.

It is my eyes which see, and the sight of my eyes grants beauty to the earth. It is my ears which hear, and the hearing of my ears gives its song to the world.

I know not and I care not. For I know what happiness is possible to me on earth. And my happiness needs no higher aim to vindicate it.

My happiness is not the means to any end. It is the end.

It is its own goal. It is its own purpose.

Neither am I the means to any end others may wish to accomplish.

I am not a tool for their use. I am not a servant of their needs. I am not a bandage for their wounds. I am not a sacrifice on their altars.

I am a man. This miracle of me is mine to own and keep, and mine to guard, and mine to use, and mine to kneel before!

Neither am I the means to any end others may wish to accomplish. I am not a tool for their use. I am not a servant of their needs. I am not a bandage for their wounds. I am not a sacrifice on their altars.

I am a man. This miracle of me is mine to own and keep, and mine to guard, and mine to use, and mine to kneel before!

I do not surrender my treasures, nor do I share them. The fortune of my spirit is not to be blown into coins of brass and flung to the winds as alms for the poor of the spirit. I guard my treasures:

The fortune of my spirit is not to be blown into coins of brass and flung to the winds as alms for the poor of the spirit. I guard my treasures: my thought, my will, my freedom. And the greatest of these is freedom.

I owe nothing to my brothers, nor do I gather debts from them.

I ask none to live for me, nor do I live for any others. I covet no man’s soul, nor is my soul theirs to covet.

And I shall choose only such as please me, and them I shall love and respect, but neither command nor obey. And we shall join our hands when we wish, or walk alone when we so desire.

For in the temple of his spirit, each man is alone.

Let each man keep his temple untouched and undefiled. Then let him join hands with others if he wishes, but only beyond his holy threshold.

This word must never be placed first within man’s soul, else it becomes a monster, the root of all the evils on earth, the root of man’s torture by men, and of an unspeakable lie.

The word “We” is as lime poured over men, which sets and hardens to stone, and crushes all beneath it, and that which is white and that which is black are lost equally in the grey of it.

It is the word by which the depraved steal the virtue of the good, by which the weak steal the might of the strong, by which the fools steal the wisdom of the sages.

And now I see the face of god, and I raise this god over the earth, this god whom men have sought since men came into being, this god who will grant them joy and peace and pride.

This god, this one word:

It was a long story, and the spirit which moved it was the spirit of man’s freedom. But what is freedom? Freedom from what? There is nothing to take a man’s freedom away from him, save other men.

To be free, a man must be free of his brothers.

That is freedom. That and nothing else.

For the battle they lost can never be lost. For that which they died to save can never perish. Through all the darkness, through all the shame of which men are capable, the spirit of man will remain alive on this earth.

It may sleep, but it will awaken. It may wear chains, but it will break through. And man will go on. Man, not men.

Here on this mountain, I and my sons and my chosen friends shall build our new land and our fort. And it will become as the heart of the earth, lost and hidden at first, but beating, beating louder each day.

And here, over the portals of my fort, I shall cut in the stone the word which is to be my beacon and my banner. The word which will not die, should we all perish in battle.

The word which can never die on this earth, for it is the heart of it and the meaning and the glory.

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