some of his critics on this matter has induced him to insert (on pp. 
74 and 92) in his dialogue with the Sphere, certain remarks which have 
a bearing on the point in question and which he had previously omitted 
as being tedious and unnecessary. 

                                 * * *

                               FLATLAND

                                PART 1

                              THIS WORLD

                SECTION 1. -- Of the Nature of Flatland

    I call our world Flatland, not because we cal it so, but to make 
its nature clearer to you, my happy readers, who are privileged to 
live in Space. 

    Imagine a vast sheet of paper on which straight Lines, Triangles, 
Squares, Pentagons, Hexagons, and other figures, instead of remaining 
fixed in their places, move freely about, on or in the surface, but 
without the power of rising above or sinking below it, very much like 
shadows -- only hard with luminous edges -- and you will then have a 
pretty correct notion of my country and countrymen.  Alas, a few years 
ago, I should have said "my universe":  but now my mind has been 
opened to higher views of things. 

    In such a country, you will perceive at once that it is impossible 
that there should be anything of what you call a "solid" kind; but I 
dare say you will suppose that we could at least distinguish by sight 
the Triangles, Squares, and other figures, moving about as I have 
described them.  On the contrary, we could see nothing of the kind, 
not at least so as to distinguish one figure from another.  Nothing 
was visible, nor could be visible, to us, except Straight Lines; and 
the necessity of this I will speedily demonstrate. 

    Place a penny on the middle of one of your tables in Space; and 
leaning over it, look down upon it.  It will appear a circle. 

    But now, drawling back to the edge of the table, gradually lower 
your eye (thus bringing yourself more and more into the condition of 
the inhabitants of Flatland), and you will find the penny becoming 
more and more oval to your view, and at last when you have placed your 
eye exactly on the edge of the table (so that you are, as it were, 
actually a Flatlander) the penny will then have ceased to appear oval 
at all, and will have become, so far as you can see, a straight line. 

    The same thing would happen if you were to treat in the same way a 
Triangle, or a Square, or any other figure cut out from pasteboard.  
As soon as you look at it with your eye on the edge of the table, you 
will find that it ceases to appear to you as a figure, and that it 
becomes in appearance a straight line.  Take for example an 
equilateral Triangle -- who represents with us a Tradesman of the 
respectable class.  Figure 1 represents the Tradesman as you would see 
him while you were bending over him from above; figures 2 and 3 
represent the Tradesman, as you would see him if your eye were close 
to the level, or all but on the level of the table; and if your eye 
were quite on the level of the table (and that is how we see him in 
Flatland) you would see nothing but a straight line. 

    When I was in Spaceland I heard that your sailors have very 
similar experiences while they traverse your seas and discern some 
distant island or coast lying on the horizon.  The far-off land may 
have bays, forelands, angles in and out to any number and extent; yet 
at a distance you see none of these (unless indeed your sun shines 
bright upon them revealing the projections and retirements by means of 
light and shade), nothing but a grey unbroken line upon the water. 

    Well, that is just what we see when one of our triangular or other 
acquaintances comes towards us in Flatland.  As there is neither sun 
with us, nor any light of such a kind as to make shadows, we have none 
of the helps to the sight that you have in Spaceland.  If our friend 
comes closer to us we see his line becomes larger; if he leaves us it 
becomes smaller; but still he looks like a straight line; be he a 
Triangle, Square, Pentagon, Hexagon, Circle, what you will -- a 
straight Line he looks and nothing else. 

    You may perhaps ask how under these disadvantages circumstances we 
are able to distinguish our friends from one another:  but the answer 
to this very natural question will be more fitly and easily given when 
I come to describe the inhabitants of Flatland.  For the present let 
me defer this subject, and say a word or two about the climate and 
houses in our country. 

                                 * * *

          SECTION 2. -- Of the Climate and Houses in Flatland

    As with you, so also with us, there are four points of the compass 
North, South, East, and West. 

    There being no sun nor other heavenly bodies, it is impossible for 
us to determine the North in the usual way; but we have a method of 
our own.  By a Law of Nature with us, there is a constant attraction 
to the South; and, although in temperate climates this is very slight 
-- so that even a Woman in reasonable health can journey several 
furlongs northward without much difficulty -- yet the hampering effort 
of the southward attraction is quite sufficient to serve as a compass 
in most parts of our earth.  Moreover, the rain (which falls at stated