Jonathan Dunn

“ Onan laughed quietly and said, “History is not an unstoppable machine, allied with fate to control the destiny of all things past and future, nor does it nullify the power of man’s freewill, yet the force that acts upon the minds of men to form them is history itself. You see, men are not the opponents of history and fate, for they do not impede its progress with their freewill decisions, instead they are its minions, its slaves, building up its strength and carrying out its dictates by its influence, so that they become history as they serve it, adding to its organism their own consciouses. ”

“ The past is constant, Jehu. It has happened and is secure in its place, explored and known. The traditions and customs of our people are steadfast and immovable, for they have survived the ages like a mountain that is untouched by the weather. They have lasted so long not because of the mere namesake of tradition, but because they work, because they have worked thousands of times before, and because we know they will work a thousand times in the future. What was good enough for the generations before us is good enough for us and our children. ”

“ Time is like an ocean, but when one looks upon it, what often happens is that all one sees is the present reflected back in its surface, and the eyes are shielded from what lies below, focusing instead on the surface, which is so trivial compared to the abyss which supports it. When one only sees the surface reflected back, then history and its wisdom lose their meaning, and one sees not the past but only the present. ”

“ We are not separate people at all, we are not different races. We are not Zards, or Canitaurs, or Munams, we are Daemians, and it is time that we came together, to help each other instead of hindering. Look at how much blood has been shed, how many lives have been lost, must we all be drowned in the blood of our brothers before we realize that we are one people? Must we suffer more than we already have in an attempt to undo what has already been done? More pain will not negate the pain that has already been felt, it will only result in more suffering than we have known up to this time. ”

“ Every moment is of the same length, but a moment in the past is nothing, its thoughts and emotions are nothing, they are gone and useless to the present, while a moment in the future is long and touchable. A thought that is past is as nothing, and it is forgotten, for the past and the future are like a one-way mirror, you can look forward into the future, but looking into the past you can see only the present reflected back at you. ”

“ At that moment I was embittered against both the Zards and the Canitaurs for their selfishness and their pretensions of morality. There is no morality where one sees another starving and suffering and does not help, when one sees a whole race of people living on a land where nothing but sorrows dwell, but will not let them share the wealth that was given one by no doing of oneself. There is no morality in selfishness, and when I saw those wretched people, I no longer felt like redeeming those on Daem from the impending doom of humanity. ”

“ Though he was about to be destroyed, he had no fear, no regrets, and in those five seconds, while Wagner and the King were frightened and frantic at their impending doom, Bernibus was as calm as ever. As I looked Bernibus in the eyes, I could hear Wagner break the dead silence with a shrill scream that echoed across the horizon and ripped through the hearts of every hearer. When faced with death he had no courage, no strength to face the unknown beyond the veil that separates life from death. ”

“ And we need not look for our redemption in the future, for it is not yet here, and when it comes it will only be what we make it. Instead let us look for our redemption in the present, where it can be found, let us put aside our hate and our divisions and become one flesh and blood, one body. People of Daem, let us live in peace!” As he said this, the Zards and the Canitaurs and the Munams all let out a joyous shout of agreement, and there was seen on every face a remnant of the happiness that had so long alluded them in their wars. ”

“ What men have seen in the past leads them in their future actions, and as a result, it is not the future that controls the present and defines the past, but it is the past which controls the present and defines the future. What sense is there in abandoning the mountain of wisdom that the past has built up and leaping blindly into hazy, unknown actions and institutions? The past is steady, Jehu, and it is known; it is the only sensible way.” Thus spoke Wagner. ”

“ As I told you in the beginning, I am written in the pages of history as the destroyer of humanity, though if it is just or not, I am not able to judge. The name of Jehu will forever be a ripple on the surface of the waters of life, and when it is heard or spoken, the only feeling that it will bring will be hatred and disgust. If only mortals could see below the surface of the waters of life, for just as the ocean can be deceiving on its surface, so can life. ”

“ Obedience not to some alien divinity, not to some social supremest, not to the blind devotion of parental mandates, but obedience to common sense, to practicality, to morality. For a taboo is not formed by any one person, instead it is slowly built up upon the experiences of many, experiences which show that when one thing is done, suffering is what follows, and when another thing is done, happiness is what follows. Of course there are a few, isolated taboos that are based instead on human prejudices, but that doesn’t translate into the abandonment of all the experience of precedents. ”

“ We are called the Pastites because of our beliefs, because of our tradition based lives that instill in us a reliance on history, on the events of the past as a light by which to guide our own actions, as a road paved by the flesh and blood of our forefathers which leads to happiness and peace. ”

“ There is to be no restoration of Daem to its original form, but a restoration of the Munams to Daem. You struggle to restore Daem, but have no compassion for the suffering of humanity across the sea. You are the fools, not me, and you are the ones who have brought us all to the very brink of destruction, to the ice ages which you have tried so hard to prevent. Do you not see that Daem is already the paradise, that the only thing that it needs for completion is the residence of the Munams? Jehu is not our kinsman redeemer at all, he is theirs. ”

“ What comes when there are no longer any taboos and traditions to break? Destruction. For as is seen time and again, the rebellion of societies gains momentum, and while their consequences are slow in gathering, in the end they multiply and force those societies over the edge of power, bringing only suffering and ruin.
“And not only are the experiences of the past wielded together into that euphoria that eludes the rebellious - wisdom - but its constant state controls the present and the future. ”

“ The actions or inactions of one solitary soul cannot bring the end of life, only the accumulation of the wrongs and injustices of a whole race, the human race. Forever I will be eyed as the assassin of humanity, and yet that is not the truth at all, for I am the father of humanity, I am the beginning as well as the end. ”

“ On the ground the trees of Daem seemed like mighty towers and battlements of nature, and on the treeway one felt suspended in air hundreds of feet above the ground on a cloud of green and growing foliage, but from afar and above they were revealed in their true splendor, shooting up from the earth as if they were the arms of the ground itself, grasping huge clusters of leaves and branches far above in their tightened fists. Some way into the forest, the ground sprang up into mountains that were as fierce and behemoth as the trees that clothed them. ”

“ Indeed, ignorance in this case only adds to the shame of the guilty, this being a crime not of misdeeds but of negligence, twisted together with the vices of humanity into a thick and sturdy cord, a rope that cannot be pulled apart and individually examined, yet must be taken as a whole. Insularly, the strand of ignorance could be easily snapped, remedied by but a little education, yet when woven together by one’s own hands with prides and prejudices, it forms an unbreakable rope, which is placed about our neck to hang us: through means of our own doing is our fate foretold. ”

“ It was Bernibus’ turn to sneer, and he did, raising the skin above his teeth and scowling fiercely at the King. “What is it that we have worked for all of our lives? Do you still not understand? You and Wagner plot to return the world to its former glory, each by his own way, but take a look around you. The trees on Daem are taller and stronger than any known before, the grasses are thicker and livelier, the waters are purer and cleaner, the wind is fresher. You know no suffering. The prophecy had nothing to do with you, and nothing at all to do with the restoration of the world! ”

“ Two cushioned chairs sat at the table and a small end table leaned up against the couch, on top of which there was a medium sized spyglass, that is, a telescope.
The sun was just coming up and shining its golden hues on the surrounding lands, which were beginning to darken as the fires of Lake Umquam Renatusum died down to a faint glow in the center of the forests of the near-north. It was the first time that I had gotten a bird’s eye view of Daem, and I was amazed at its beauty. ”

“ That is what makes history an organic being, and by history I mean all of the past, or all of the future, depending on your viewpoint.
A book is a connection between times and peoples, more so than any other medium. As I put these words down in writing, it is as if I am imparting my very self into the pages. And as you read them, the name Jehu slowly forms into an image, into a personality, and from the empty word Jehu comes the great well of affection springing from a personal intimacy. ”

“ This is the Hall of Time, and that is the altar to Temis, the God of Time. It is a very sacred place, to both us and the Canitaurs, for it was built by Temis himself, before the race of man inhabited the earth. By the time any men came to live on Daem, it had been buried by the dirt and debris of thousands of years, but when the Great War took place, the shock uncovered it and revealed it to men, a sort of revelation that came only as it was needed the most. ”

“ You see, Jehu, the question of time is not so linear as you would think. You know full well that the conflict between the Zards and Canitaurs is over how to address the renewing of the earth: they would send you, our kinsman redeemer, back into time to prevent the nuclear wars, while we would send you to the future to bring back its completion. They hold to traditions as if they were the foundation of life, while our people have no traditions in the traditional sense, if I may use that oxymoronic phrase, but we look to what will come instead of what has passed. ”

“ I was walking in silence through the rugged forests of northern Daem alongside Bernibus the Canitaur, with his fellows Wagner and Taurus before and behind us, respectively, the former leading the way, the latter covering our tracks, and both on the lookout for an ambush. An entire lifetime of guerrilla warfare and privations of all kinds had instilled in the Canitaurs a strong and prevailing sense of caution, which sometimes rendered their lighthearted and almost spiritually frivolous nature to the casual observer a dense, deceiving demeanor used to conceal their true selves. ”

“ The past is the past, not the present nor the future, its time has been spent, its part in the theater of life is over, it is extinct. Jehu, Wagner speaks of us as rebelliously breaking taboos that were formed by our forefathers, but that is not true. In the present more is known than was known in the past, they had outdated views and opinions, and their ideologies were vulgar and unsophisticated. At present we are more knowledgeable, more refined than what has gone before. The people of the past waged unjust wars. ”

“ You are all no doubt familiar with the ancient prophecy of the Externus Miraculum: long ago it was told that in our extreme need, when hope no longer exists in the hearts of many, an ancient would be sent by Onan our lord to redeem and deliver us from the evils of this world, for as our doom was wrought in their times, so would our hope originate. The past cannot be changed except by those who first made it, and our present is dictated by the happenings of the past, so that for a better future the past must be changed, and only then will we be freed from the burdens of history. ”

“ For, as you probably know, time and matter are the foundations of physical existence, and while the two components are independent, they are also parallel. Matter is always revolving, from its simplest form in the atom to its greatest in the universe, everything is revolving and rotating. So is time. Imagine time as a galaxy, revolving continually around the black hole at its center, that is, an enigma that is actually devoid of all matter. Time is revolving around a great enigma as well, which is devoid of time, that enigma being eternity. ”