chapter 2

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晚饭后的惬意时光，时光旅行者在给“我们”讲述这深奥难懂的观点，给我们讲述数学几何的抽象概念。他提出：空间有四个维度——长、宽、高，以及持续度。那么问题来了，“为什么我们不能在时间的维度中自由活动呢？”。时间旅行者怎么回答的呢？且看本章分解~

Chapter 2

The Time Traveller smiled. “Are you so sure we can move freely in

Space? Right and left we can go, backward and forward freely enough,

and men always have done so. I admit we move freely in two dimensions.

But how about up and down? Gravitation limits us there.”

“Not exactly,” said the Medical Man. “There are balloons.”

“But before the balloons, save for spasmodic jumping and the

inequalities of the surface, man had no freedom of vertical movement.”

“Still they could move a little up and down,” said the Medical Man.

“Easier, far easier down than up.”

“And you cannot move at all in Time, you cannot get away from the

present moment.”

“My dear sir, that is just where you are wrong. That is just where the

whole world has gone wrong. We are always getting away from the present

moment. Our mental existences, which are immaterial and have no

dimensions, are passing along the Time-Dimension with a uniform

velocity from the cradle to the grave. Just as we should travel _down_

if we began our existence fifty miles above the earth’s surface.”

“But the great difficulty is this,” interrupted the Psychologist. ’You

_can_ move about in all directions of Space, but you cannot move about

in Time.”

“That is the germ of my great discovery. But you are wrong to say that

we cannot move about in Time. For instance, if I am recalling an

incident very vividly I go back to the instant of its occurrence: I

become absent-minded, as you say. I jump back for a moment. Of course

we have no means of staying back for any length of Time, any more than

a savage or an animal has of staying six feet above the ground. But a

civilised man is better off than the savage in this respect. He can go

up against gravitation in a balloon, and why should he not hope that

ultimately he may be able to stop or accelerate his drift along the

Time-Dimension, or even turn about and travel the other way?”

“Oh, _this_,” began Filby, “is all—”

“Why not?” said the Time Traveller.

“It’s against reason,” said Filby.

“What reason?” said the Time Traveller.

“You can show black is white by argument,” said Filby, “but you will

never convince me.”

“Possibly not,” said the Time Traveller. “But now you begin to see the

object of my investigations into the geometry of Four Dimensions. Long

ago I had a vague inkling of a machine—”

“To travel through Time!” exclaimed the Very Young Man.

“That shall travel indifferently in any direction of Space and Time, as

the driver determines.”

Filby contented himself with laughter.

“But I have experimental verification,” said the Time Traveller.

“It would be remarkably convenient for the historian,” the Psychologist

suggested. “One might travel back and verify the accepted account of

the Battle of Hastings, for instance!”

“Don’t you think you would attract attention?” said the Medical Man.

“Our ancestors had no great tolerance for anachronisms.”

“One might get one’s Greek from the very lips of Homer and Plato,” the

Very Young Man thought.

“In which case they would certainly plough you for the Little-go. The

German scholars have improved Greek so much.”

“Then there is the future,” said the Very Young Man. “Just think! One

might invest all one’s money, leave it to accumulate at interest, and

hurry on ahead!”

“To discover a society,” said I, “erected on a strictly communistic

basis.”

“Of all the wild extravagant theories!” began the Psychologist.

“Yes, so it seemed to me, and so I never talked of it until—”

“Experimental verification!” cried I. “You are going to verify _that_?”

“The experiment!” cried Filby, who was getting brain-weary.

“Let’s see your experiment anyhow,” said the Psychologist, “though it’s

all humbug, you know.”

The Time Traveller smiled round at us. Then, still smiling faintly, and

with his hands deep in his trousers pockets, he walked slowly out of

the room, and we heard his slippers shuffling down the long passage to

his laboratory.

The Psychologist looked at us. “I wonder what he’s got?”

“Some sleight-of-hand trick or other,” said the Medical Man, and Filby

tried to tell us about a conjuror he had seen at Burslem, but before he

had finished his preface the Time Traveller came back, and Filby’s

anecdote collapsed.

 II

 The Machine

The thing the Time Traveller held in his hand was a glittering metallic

framework, scarcely larger than a small clock, and very delicately

made. There was ivory in it, and some transparent crystalline

substance. And now I must be explicit, for this that follows—unless his

explanation is to be accepted—is an absolutely unaccountable thing. He

took one of the small octagonal tables that were scattered about the

room, and set it in front of the fire, with two legs on the hearthrug.

On this table he placed the mechanism. Then he drew up a chair, and sat

down. The only other object on the table was a small shaded lamp, the

bright light of which fell upon the model. There were also perhaps a

dozen candles about, two in brass candlesticks upon the mantel and

several in sconces, so that the room was brilliantly illuminated. I sat

in a low arm-chair nearest the fire, and I drew this forward so as to

be almost between the Time Traveller and the fireplace. Filby sat

behind him, looking over his shoulder. The Medical Man and the

Provincial Mayor watched him in profile from the right, the

Psychologist from the left. The Very Young Man stood behind the

Psychologist. We were all on the alert. It appears incredible to me

that any kind of trick, however subtly conceived and however adroitly

done, could have been played upon us under these conditions.（1071）

今日短语

1. save for 除了...之外

2. get away from sb. / sth. 摆脱（困难或不愉快的事，或某种限制）

3. move about 不停地走动;到处旅行,到处活动

4. absent-minded心不在焉的

5. have no means of doing sth. 没有办法做某事

6. in this respect 在这方面

7. better off 更好的

8. investigations into对...的调查;侦查

9. content yourself with (doing) sth.  使自己满足（甘心）于（做）某事

10. draw up a chair把椅子拉近

11. on the alert提防；警戒着；随时准备着

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