" Until the moment when
I placed my mouth in his World, he had neither seen me, nor heard
anything except confused sounds beating against, what I called his side,
but what he called his INSIDE or STOMACH; nor had he even now the least
conception of the region from which I had come. Outside his World,
or Line, all was a blank to him; nay, not even a blank, for a blank
implies Space; say, rather, all was non-existent.
His subjects--of whom the small Lines were men and the Points Women--
were all alike confined in motion and eyesight to that single Straight Line,
which was their World. It need scarcely be added that the whole of their
horizon was limited to a Point; nor could any one ever see anything
but a Point. Man, woman, child, thing--each as a Point to the eye
of a Linelander. Only by the sound of the voice could sex or age
be distinguished. Moreover, as each individual occupied the whole
of the narrow path, so to speak, which constituted his Universe,
and no one could move to the right or left to make way for passers by,
it followed that no Linelander could ever pass another. Once neighbours,
always neighbours.
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