Date: Thu, 1 Feb 1996 22:33:29 -0500 (EST) From: David Akers To: Thomas_Banchoff@postoffice.brown.edu Subject: 1884 response MIME-Version: 1.0 Professor Banchoff, My research into the time period in which Abbott wrote took several forms. First I studied issues of the London Times, looking for.. 1) a general focus upon certain issues, in an attempt to determine the major concerns of the day. 2) articles which related specifically to Flatland or the specific interests of its author. The London Times in 1884 appears to have been a paper primarily oriented toward commercial and/or professional interests. Every paper contained a multitude of "financial intelligence" designed to inform its readers of a quickly changing world. The paper also contained massive amounts of information on foreign policy. Each country had at least a paragraph or two describing the latest developments. There was often a long column devoted solely to the crisis in Egypt and the Sudan. In this paper I also discovered an interesting article which quoted heavily from a graduation speech made at London University. The speech focused primarily upon the importance of encouraging womens' access to higher educational institutions. The speaker was obviously quite irate about the current state of women in society, and made his point forcefully. While I was in the library, I also took the time to search for articles written by Edwin Abbott which might reveal more direct insights into his opinions about the society he lived in. It turns out that he wrote a 22 page article called "Illusion in Religion" in 1890. In this article, Abbott procedes to explain many of his views on religion. "I wish to show," Abbott states, "that in religion, as well as in science, we must be prepared for illusions, trying to discern the truth beneath them, and to get out of them as much good as we can, until the time arrives when the kernel of truth in them is separable from the husk of error." To illustrate his point concerning illusions, Abbott contrasts common perceptions of astronomy with the truth. "When we say 'The Sun is just setting,' we ought to say, 'The sun set seven or eight minutes ago.'" Abbott concludes that the same degree of scientific doubt should be applied toward religion, concluding: "Believers have been only too ready to take priests and theologians at their word, that theology is a dead, unprogressive scheme, no more to be explained than the rules of a game; and if you ask them, 'How can it be just that God should impute righteousness?' they stare at you as if you were saying, 'How can it be just that the pawn in chess should not move backward?' This attack upon priests is especially interesting considering the negative depictions of priests in Flatland. David Akers