The Time Machine | Page 2

and is always definable
by reference to three planes, each at right angles to the others. But some philosophical
people have been asking why THREE dimensions particularly--why not another direction
at right angles to the other three?--and have even tried to construct a Four-Dimension
geometry. Professor Simon Newcomb was expounding this to the New York
Mathematical Society only a month or so ago. You know how on a flat surface, which
has only two dimensions, we can represent a figure of a three-dimensional solid, and
similarly they think that by models of thee dimensions they could represent one of
four--if they could master the perspective of the thing. See?'
`I think so,' murmured the Provincial Mayor; and, knitting his brows, he lapsed into an
introspective state, his lips moving as one who repeats mystic words. `Yes, I think I see it
now,' he said after some time, brightening in a quite transitory manner.
`Well, I do not mind telling you I have been at work upon this geometry of Four
Dimensions for some time. Some of my results are curious. For instance, here is a portrait
of a man at eight years old, another at fifteen, another at seventeen, another at
twenty-three, and so on. All these are evidently sections, as it were, Three-Dimensional
representations of his Four-Dimensioned being, which is a fixed and unalterable thing.
`Scientific people,' proceeded the Time Traveller, after the pause required for the proper
assimilation of this, `know very well that Time is only a kind of Space. Here is a popular
scientific diagram, a weather record. This line I trace with my finger shows the
movement of the barometer. Yesterday it was so high, yesterday night it fell, then this
morning it rose again, and so gently upward to here. Surely the mercury did not trace this
line in any of the dimensions of Space generally recognized? But certainly it traced such
a line, and that line, therefore, we must conclude was along the Time-Dimension.'
`But,' said the Medical Man, staring hard at a coal in the fire, `if Time is really only a
fourth dimension of Space, why is it, and why has it always been, regarded as something
different? And why cannot we move in Time as we move about in the other dimensions
of Space?'
The Time Traveller smiled. `Are you sure we can move freely in Space? Right and left
we can go, backward and forward freely enough, and men always have done so. I admit

we move freely in two dimensions. But how about up and down? Gravitation limits us
there.'
`Not exactly,' said the Medical Man. `There are balloons.'
`But before the balloons, save for spasmodic jumping and the inequalities of the surface,
man had no freedom of vertical movement.' `Still they could move a little up and down,'
said the Medical Man.
`Easier, far easier down than up.'
`And you cannot move at all in Time, you cannot get away from the present moment.'
`My dear sir, that is just where you are wrong. That is just where the whole world has
gone wrong. We are always getting away from the present moment. Our mental
existences, which are immaterial and have no dimensions, are passing along the
Time-Dimension with a uniform velocity from the cradle to the grave. Just as we should
travel DOWN if we began our existence fifty miles above the earth's surface.'
`But the great difficulty is this,' interrupted the Psychologist. `You CAN move about in
all directions of Space, but you cannot move about in Time.'
`That is the germ of my great discovery. But you are wrong to say that we cannot move
about in Time. For instance, if I am recalling an incident very vividly I go back to the
instant of its occurrence: I become absent-minded, as you say. I jump back for a moment.
Of course we have no means of staying back for any length of Time, any more than a
savage or an animal has of staying six feet above the ground. But a civilized man is better
off than the savage in this respect. He can go up against gravitation in a balloon, and why
should he not hope that ultimately he may be able to stop or accelerate his drift along the
Time-Dimension, or even turn about and travel the other way?'
`Oh, THIS,' began Filby, `is all--'
`Why not?' said the Time Traveller.
`It's against reason,' said Filby.
`What reason?' said the Time Traveller.
`You can show black is white by argument,' said Filby, `but you will never convince me.'
`Possibly not,' said the Time Traveller. `But now you begin to see the object of my
investigations into the geometry of Four Dimensions. Long ago I had a vague inkling of a
machine--'
`To travel