Voyages to the Moon and the Sun

by Cyrano de Bergerac

On the banks of Memory there is heard night and day the importunate calling of Jays, Parrots, Magpies, Starlings, Linnets, Finches, and birds of all kinds, which twitter what they have learned. At night they say nothing, because they are then occupied in drinking the thick vapour exhaled from these aquatic places. But their feeble stomachs digest it so ill that in the morning when they think they have converted it into their own substance it is seen to flow from their bills as pure as if it were in the river. The water of this river seems viscous and flows noisily; the echoes formed in its caverns repeat its speech more than a thousand times; it engenders certain monsters, whose faces are like the face of Woman. Others yet more furious are seen with square horny heads very similar to those of our Pedants. These do nothing but exclaim, and yet say nothing but what they have heard other people say.

The river of Imagination flows more gently; its light brilliant fluid sparkles on all sides; when one looks at this water composed of a torrent of damp sparks they seem to observe no certain order as they fly along. When I had observed it more attentively I took notice that the humour that flowed in its bed was pure potable gold and its foam oil of talc. The fishes it breeds are Remoræ, Sirens, and Salamanders; instead of gravel there are to be found those pebbles of which Pliny speaks, which make one heavy when touched on one side and light when applied on the other side. I noticed others again, of which Gyges had a ring, which renders invisible; but above all a large number of philosopher's stones glittered in its sands. On its banks were numerous fruit-trees, principally those found by Mohammed in Paradise; the branches swarmed with phœnixes, and I noticed seedlings of that fruit-tree whence Discord plucked the apple she cast at the feet of the three Goddesses; they had grafted on it shoots from the garden of the Hesperides. Each of these two wide rivers separated into an infinity of interlacing arms; and I observed that when a large stream of Memory approached a smaller one of Imagination the former immediately exterminated the latter; but on the contrary, if the stream of Imagination were larger, it dried up that of Memory. Now, since these three streams always flow side by side, either in their main channel or in their branches, wherever Memory is strong, Imagination diminishes, and the one increases as the other sinks.

Near at hand the river of Judgment flows incredibly slowly; its channel is deep, its fluid seems cold, and when scattered on anything dries instead of moistens. In the mud of its bed grow plants of Hellebore,[83] whose roots spreading out in long filaments purify the water of its mouth. It nourishes serpents, and a million elephants repose on the soft grass which carpets its banks; like its two cousins it splits into an infinity of little branches; it increases as it flows and although it always gains ground turns and returns upon itself eternally.

The whole Sun is watered with the moisture of these three rivers; it serves to dilute the burning atoms of those who die in this great world; but this deserves to be treated more at length.

The life of animals in the Sun is very long; they only die by a natural death, which never occurs until the end of seven or eight thousand years, when from the continuous excesses of mind to which their fiery temperament inclines them, the order of their matter grows confused; for as soon as Nature feels in a body that more time is needed to repair the ruins of its being than to compose a new one, she tends to dissolve it; so that from day to day the animal is seen, not to rot, but to fall into particles like red ashes.

Death only happens in this way. When he has expired, or rather, is extinguished, the small igneous bodies which composed his substance enter the gross matter of this lighted world until chance has watered them with the fluid of these three rivers; for then, becoming mobile through their fluidity, with the purpose of exercising quickly the faculties which this water has impressed upon their obscure comprehension, they attach themselves in long threads, and, by a flood of luminous points sharpen into rays and are scattered upon the surrounding spheres, where they are no sooner enveloped than they arrange the matter as far as they can in the shape proper to exercise all the functions, whose instinct they acquired in the water of the three rivers, the five fountains and the Pool; and so they allow themselves to be attracted to plants to vegetate; plants allow themselves to be cropped by animals to feel, and animals allow themselves to be eaten by men in order that by passing into their substance they may repair those three faculties of Memory, Imagination and Judgment, whose power they presaged in the rivers of the Sun.

Now, according to whether the atoms have been more or less soaked in the moisture of these three rivers, they bring the animals more or less Memory, Imagination or Judgment; and according to whether, while they were in the three rivers, they absorbed more or less of the liquid of the five fountains and of the little Lake, they elaborate in them more or less perfect senses and produce more or less sleepy souls.

This is approximately what we observed, as touching the nature of these three rivers. Their little veins are to be met with scattered here and there; but the principal arms all debouch in the province of the philosophers; and so we returned to the highway without going farther from the stream than was necessary to get on to the road. We could see the whole time the three large rivers flowing beside us; but we watched from above the five streams winding below us through the meadows. This road, although solitary, is very agreeable; one breathes a free subtle air there, which feeds the soul and causes it to reign over the passions.

At the end of five or six days' journey, while we were delighting our eyes in considering the different rich aspects of the landscape, a languishing voice like a sick person moaning reached our ears. We approached the place from which we imagined it might come and on the bank of the river Imagination we found an old man, who had fallen backwards and was uttering loud cries. Tears of compassion came into my eyes and the pity I felt for this wretch's misfortune compelled me to ask the reason.

"This man", replied Campanella, turning towards me, "is a philosopher in the death agony; for we die more than once, and since we are merely parts of this Universe we change our shape in order to take up our lives again elsewhere; and this is not an evil, but a method of perfecting one's being and of acquiring an infinite amount of knowledge. His malady is that which causes the death of nearly all great men."