PRINCIPLE

Situations on the Chess-board require for their demonstration a degree of skill which decreases as the hostile power of resistance decreases.

All power for resistance possessed by an army emanates from its ability to move. This faculty of Mobility is that inestimable quality without which nothing and by means of which everything, can be done.

From this truth it is easy to deduce the common object of all movement, which obviously is:

To minimize the mobility of the opposing force.

The hostile army having the ability to move and consequently a power for resistance equal to that possessed by the kindred army; it becomes of the first importance to discover in what way the kindred army is superior to that adverse force, which in the Normal Situation on the Chess-board is its exact counterpart in material, position and formation.

Such normal superiority of the White army over the Black army is found in the fact that:

While no mathematical demonstration of the outcome of a game at Chess is possible, nevertheless there are rational grounds for assuming that with exact play, White should win.

This decided and probably decisive advantage possessed by White can be minimized only by correcting a mathematical blemish in the game of Chess as at present constructed; which blemish, there is reason to believe, did not originally exist.

This imperfection seemingly is the result of unscientific modifications of the Italian method of Castling; which latter, from the standpoint of mathematics and of Strategetics, embodies the true spirit of that delicate and vital evolution.

To the mathematician and to the Strategist, it is clear that Chess as first devised was geometrically perfect. The abortions played during successive ages and in various parts of the Earth, merely are crude and unscientific deviations from the perfect original.

Thus, strategetically, the correct post of deployment for the Chess-King is at the extremity of a straight line drawn from the center of that Grand Strategic Front which appertains to the existing formation.

Hence, in the grand front by the right, the King in Castling K R, properly goes in one move to KKt1, his proper post. Conversely, in Castling Q R, he also should go in one move to QKt1, his proper post corresponding to the grand front by the left.

Again, whenever the formation logically points to the grand front by the right refused, the King should go in one move from K1 to KR1. When the formations indicate the grand front by the left refused, the King should go in one move from K1 to QR1.

In each and every case the co-operating Rook should be posted at the corresponding Bishop’s square, in order to support the alignment by P-B4, of the front adopted.

The faulty mode of castling today in vogue clearly is not the product either of the mathematic nor of the strategetic mind.

The infantile definition of “the books,” viz., “The King in Castling moves two squares either to the right or to the left,” displays all that mania for the commonplace, which characterizes the dilettante.

All that can be done is to call attention to this baleful excrescence on the great Game. Of course, it is useless to combat it. In the words of the Count de Saxe:

“The power of custom is absolute. To depart from it is a crime, and the most inexcusable of all crimes is to introduce innovations. For most people, it is sufficient that a thing is so, to forever allow it to remain so.”

Says the great Frederic;

“Man hardly may eradicate in his short lifetime all the prejudices that are imbibed with his mother’s milk; and it is well nigh impossible to successfully wrestle with custom, that chief argument of fools.”

Also bearing in mind the irony of Cicero, who regarded himself fortunate in that he had not fallen victim to services rendered his countrymen, it suffices to say:

The true Chessic dictum in regard to the double evolution of the King and Rook should read:

“The King of Castling should deploy in one move to that point where, as the Base of Operations, it mathematically harmonizes with that Strategic Front, which is, or must become, established.”

The change in the present form of Castling, herein suggested, should be made in the true interests of the Royal Game.

The instant effect of such change will be:

In all our modern-day mis-interpretations of the ethics of Chess and our characteristic Twentieth Century looseness of practice as applied to Chess-play, perhaps there exists no greater absurdity, than that subversion of ordinary intelligence, daily evinced by permitting a piece which cannot move, to give check.

It is a well known and in many ways a deserved reproach, cast by the German erudite, that the mind of the Anglo-Saxon is not properly developed, that it is able to act correctly only when dealing with known quantities, and is inadequate for the elucidation of indeterminate things.

In consequence, they say, the argumentative attempts of the Anglo-Saxon are puerile; the natural result of a mental limitation which differs from that of monkeys and parrots, merely in ability to count beyond two.

Surely it would seem that a very young child readily would sense that:

A Chess-piece, which by law is debarred from movement, is, by the same law, necessarily debarred from capturing adverse material; inasmuch as in order to capture, a piece must move.

Nevertheless consensus of opinion today among children of every growth and whether Anglo-Saxon or German, universally countenance the paradox that:

A piece which is pinned on its own King, can give check i.e., threaten to move and capture the adverse King.

To argue this question correctly and to deduce the logical solution, it is necessary to revert to first principles and to note that:

It is a fundamental of Chess mathematics that the King cannot be exposed to capture.

Furthermore, it is to be noted as equally fundamental, that:

Hence, it is obvious and may be mathematically demonstrated, that,

Therefore, whatever may be the normal area of movement belonging to a piece, whenever from any cause such piece loses its power of movement, then,

It no longer can capture, nor exercise any threat of capture, upon the points contained within said area; and consequently such points so far as said immovable piece is concerned, may be occupied in safety by any adverse piece including the adverse King, for the reason that:

An immovable piece cannot move; and not being able to move it cannot capture, and not being able to capture, it does not exercise any threat of capture, and consequently it cannot give check.

This incongruity of permitting an immovable piece to give check constitutes the second mathematical blemish in the game of Chess, as at present constructed.

This fallacy, the correction of which any schoolboy may mathematically demonstrate, is defended, even by many who would know better, if they merely would take time for reflection; by the inane assumption, that:

A piece which admittedly is disqualified and rendered dormant by all the fundamentals of the science of Chess, and which therefore cannot legally move and consequently cannot legally capture anything; by some hocus-pocus may be made to move and to capture that most valuable of all prizes, the adverse King; and this at a time and under circumstances when, as is universally allowed, it cannot legally move against, nor legally capture any other adverse piece.

The basis of this illogical, illegal, and untenable assumption is:

The pinned piece, belonging to that force which has the privilege of moving, can abandon its post, and capture the adverse King; this stroke ends the game and the game being ended, the pinning piece never can avail of the abandonment of the covering post by the pinned piece to capture the King thus exposed.

The insufficiency of this subterfuge is clear to the mathematical mind. Its subtlety lies in confounding together things which have no connection, viz.:

Admittedly the given body of Chess-pieces has the right to move, but it is of the utmost importance to note that this privilege of moving extends only to a single piece and from this privilege of moving the pinned piece is debarred by a specific and fundamental law of the game, which declares that:

“A piece shall not by removing itself uncover the kindred King to the attack of a hostile piece.”

Thus, it is clear, that a pinned piece is a disqualified piece; its powers are dormant and by the laws of the game it is temporarily reduced to an inert mass, and deprived of every faculty normally appertaining to it as a Chess-piece. On the other hand, as is equally obvious, the pinning piece is in full possession of its normal powers and is qualified to perform every function.

To hold that a piece disqualified by the laws of the game can nullify the activities of a piece in full possession of its powers, is to assert that black is white, that the moon is made of green cheese, that the tail can wag the dog, or any other of those things which have led the German to promulgate his caustic formula on the Anglo-Saxon.

Hence, artificially to nullify the normal powers of an active and potential piece which is operating in conformity to the laws of the game, and artificially to revivify the dormant powers of a piece disqualified by the same laws; to debar the former from exercising its legitimate functions and to permit the latter to exercise functions from which by law, it specifically is debarred, is a self-evident incongruity and any argument whereby such procedure is upheld, necessarily and obviously, is sophistry.

No less interesting than instructive and conclusive, is reference of this question to those intellectual principles which give birth to the game of Chess, per se, viz.:

As a primary fundamental, with the power to give check, is associated concurrently the obligation upon the King thus checked, not to remain in check.

Secondly: The totality of powers assigned to the Chess-pieces is the ability to move, provided the King be free from check. This totality of powers may be denoted by the indefinite symbol, X.

The play thus has for its object:

The reduction to zero of the adverse X, by the operation of the kindred X.

This result is checkmate in its generalized form. In effect, it is the destruction of the power of the adverse pieces to move, by means of check made permanent.

By the law of continuity it is self-evident that:

The power to move appertaining either to White or to Black, runs from full power to move any piece (a power due to freedom from check), down to total inability to move any piece, due to his King being permanently checked, i.e., checkmated.

This series cannot be interrupted without obvious violation of the ethics of the game; because, so long as any part of X remains, the principle from which the series emanated still operates, and this without regard to quantity of X remaining unexpended.

Thus, a game of Chess is a procedure from total ability to total disability; i.e., from one logical whole to another; otherwise, from X to zero.

Checkmate, furnishes the limit to the series; the game and X vanish together.

This is in perfect keeping with the law of continuity, which acts and dominates from beginning to end of the series, and so long as any part of X remains.

Hence to permit either White or Black to move any piece, leaving his King in check, is an anomaly.

Denial to the Pawn of ability to move to the rear is an accurate interpretation of military ethics.

Of those puerile hypotheses common to the man who does not know, one of the most entrancing to the popular mind, is the notion that Corps d’armee properly are of equal numbers and of the same composition.

This supposition is due to ignorance of the fact that the multifarious duties of applied Strategetics, require for their execution like variety of instruments, which diversity of means is strikingly illustrated by the differing movements of the Chess-pieces.

The inability of the Pawn to move backward strategically harmonizes with its functions as a Corps of Position, in contradiction to the movements of the pieces, which latter are Corps of Evolution.

This restriction in the move of the Pawn is in exact harmony with the inability of the Queen to move on obliques, of the Rook to move on obliques or on diagonals, of the Bishop to move on obliques, verticals and horizontals, of the Knight to move on diagonals, verticals, and horizontals, and of the King to move like any other piece.

Possessed of the invaluable privilege of making the first move in the game, knowing that no move should be made without an object, understanding that the true object of every move is to minimize the adverse power for resistance and comprehending that all power for resistance is derived from facility of movement, the student easily deduces the true object of White’s initial move in every game of Chess, viz.: