“He would then select emperors,” said Otto.
“And would-be emperors would hasten to do his will,” said Iaachus.
“And without risk he would rule worlds,” said Otto.
“At his word,” said Iaachus, “he might declare an emperor unfit, false, or illegitimate, unfavored by Karch, and his subjects thereby relieved of all allegiance and duties to their sovereign.”
“Madness,” said Otto.
“Weapons, even in the hands of the insane, have edges and weight. A knife in the hand of a lunatic is still sharp. It obeys the hand that wields it.”
“Surely men can see through this sort of thing, understand its purposes, the motivations involved,” said Otto.
“Some men,” said Iaachus. “Not others. And many men who understand the absurdity, the sickness, and the madness refrain from speaking, reluctant to perish at the hands of homicidal zealots.”
“There are rumors, too,” said Tuvo Ausonius, “of miracles.”
“Of course,” said Iaachus, “why not? Do they not, supposedly, abound in the pantheon of Orak and Umba, and in the lore of a thousand other faiths, sometimes weird and minor faiths, on ten thousand worlds?”
“What is a miracle?” asked Otto.
“Words are easily multiplied,” said Iaachus. “Facile verbalism produces in simple minds the illusion of understanding. In reality the concept is unintelligible.”
“Let us suppose,” said Julian, “that Orak supposedly does something which violates the laws of nature.”
“How would one know it violated the laws of nature?” asked Otto.
“One would not,” said Julian.
“What if there were no laws of nature?” asked Otto.
“Even granted iron laws of nature, which seems unlikely,” said Iaachus, “many unusual and surprising things still take place, things we do not understand and cannot now explain.”
“Miracles?” asked Otto.
“There seems little point in calling them that, but I suppose one could do so, if one wished,” said Julian. “Most, of course, have no relationship whatsoever to one faith or another.”
“Perhaps such things could be staged, faked, and such,” said Otto. “Tricks, such as magicians perform, dazzling us.”
“Or more likely, simply alleged to have occurred,” said Iaachus. “Lies are less costly than tricks, which often require a context, an apparatus, confederates, and such.”
“What is the point of miracles?” asked Otto.
“They are supposed to attest the soundness of claims and doctrine,” said Iaachus. “They cannot do so, of course, for a variety of reasons. For example, logical relations obtain amongst propositions, formulas, and such, whereas things, occurrences, and phenomena do not entail anything, no more than, say, waterfalls, trees, and rocks. Surprising events, for example, are cognitively independent of their interpretation. Any event might be interpreted variously. Let us suppose that I maintained that the star of Telnaria orbited Telnaria, rather than Telnaria orbiting its star, and produced an unusual event. That would not prove that our star spun about our world. Similarly, suppose I claimed to be a prophet of Karch and something surprising took place. That would not prove I was a prophet of Karch, or even that there was such a thing as Karch. The point may be even more easily made. Let us suppose we have three individuals making incompatible claims, only one of which could be true, if any, and each of these individuals produced exactly the same miracle, or unusual phenomenon. What is one then to suppose, that the three logically incompatible claims are all true? Rather, it is clear that surprising occurrences and truth are logically independent.”
“When I was a boy, tending pigs in the festung village of Sim Giadini,” said Otto, “I wondered why faiths did not begin earlier, why they waited for thousands of years to appear. If Orak or Karch, or some other god or gods, made the world, if it was made, should they not have made their faith at the same time? For example, many must have died, tragically deprived, before this or that faith was even known.”
“It had not been invented yet,” said Iaachus.
“Many of the brothers in the festung,” said Otto, “claimed to have had visions of Floon.”
“And doubtless many did,” said Iaachus. “Experience is internal to the organism. It commonly has both internal and external causes. There is doubtless a tree outside your body but your seeing of the tree is within you, an aspect of your consciousness. It could not be otherwise. All experience is internal to the organism, but some experiences may lack external causes. They may have only internal causes. The most common instance of this is the dream. The dream tree is internally generated. It is rooted only in dream soil, and shimmers only in dream light.”
“Men sometimes see what they hope to see, what they want to see,” said Julian.
“Certainly thousands have had visions of Orak and Umba, and thousands of other gods,” said Iaachus.
“What of signs in the sky, as claimed on several worlds?” said Otto.
“It is easy to see figures in the clouds,” said Iaachus, “particularly if one wishes to see them, is eager to see them, and so on. Furthermore, some such claims seem to have been simply fabricated, as they are not reported in other sources in the same locale at the same time. Too, not everyone inspecting the sky sees such things, even at the same time others are claiming to do so. Remember the internality of experience. And, who knows how many claim to see such things who do not see such things, for one reason or another, perhaps wishing to conform, perhaps wishing to be approved, perhaps wishing to gain attention, perhaps wishing to seem important, perhaps wishing to avoid discrimination or persecution.”
“It is hard to know what to think,” said Otto.
“Things which do not move, too,” said Iaachus, “may seem to move. This has to do with movements in the eye itself.”
“What of those on whose bodies appear the marks of the torture rack?” said Otto.
“The mind,” said Iaachus, “can do strange things with the body.”
“It is hard to know what to think,” said Otto.
“Perhaps it is not all that hard, dear friend,” said Julian.
“The trust which human beings have is surely one of their most endearing characteristics,” said Iaachus. “Without it the enterprises of the charlatan and fraud would be far more difficult and perilous.”
“Why should Sidonicus, if he has, spread rumors of the princesses being on holiday?” said Julian. “Surely he knows the truth, if only from the empress mother.”
“May I speculate?” said Tuvo Ausonius.
“Surely, noble Ausonius,” said Iaachus.
“The Floonian ministrants wish to stand between humans, and other rational species, and Karch. They wish to control access to the table of Karch. Accordingly, they have the business of the smudging with oil, the approved prayers, the demanded exercises and required services, reserving to themselves the exclusive alleviation of the miseries and guilts which they themselves have produced, and so on.”
“Continue,” said Iaachus.
“Compatible with this program of managing and controlling the lives of others, whose economic resources they command, and on which they rely, they wish to regulate and supervise matings, to approve or disapprove of marriages, to perform or dissolve marriages.”
“That is known to me,” said Iaachus.
“Suppose, then,” said Tuvo Ausonius, “the princesses, in their alleged holiday, encountered, and allegedly fell in love with, as the reports might have it, unexpected and magnificent swains, young, handsome princes of mighty barbarian nations.”