The professions, the public
services, are closed against them, and though in most States they
are not actually debarred from marriage, yet they have the greatest
difficulty in forming suitable alliances, as experience shews that
the offspring of such unfortunate and ill-endowed parents is generally
itself unfortunate, if not positively Irregular.
It is from these specimens of the refuse of our Nobility that the great
Tumults and Seditions of past ages have generally derived their leaders;
and so great is the mischief thence arising that an increasing minority
of our more progressive Statesmen are of opinion that true mercy would
dictate their entire suppression, by enacting that all who fail to pass
the Final Examination of the University should be either imprisoned
for life, or extinguished by a painless death.
But I find myself digressing into the subject of Irregularities,
a matter of such vital interest that it demands a separate section.
SECTION 7 Concerning Irregular Figures
Throughout the previous pages I have been assuming--what perhaps
should have been laid down at the beginning as a distinct and
fundamental proposition--that every human being in Flatland
is a Regular Figure, that is to say of regular construction.
Pages:
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57