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Cyrano de Bergerac's
Fired By Secret
Knowledge, Cyrano Attempts To Reach The Moon By Riding On Bottles
Of Dew
"Thus, perhaps," I said, "at this very moment someone on the Moon is laughing at someone else who maintains that our globe is a world." And although I reminded them that this opinion had been held by Pythagoras, Epicurus, Democritus, and, in our own time, Copernicus and Kepler, I only succeeded in provoking them to further laughter.
The audacity of this notion stuck sideways in my mind, driven in by its very contradictions. Finally it became lodged so deeply in me that, during the rest of the journey, I felt pregnant with a thousand definitions of the Moon, none of which I could bring to light. At last, having shored up my crazy notion with a number of serious explanations, I found that I had almost persuaded myself of it. But listen, Reader, to the miracle or accident from Providence or Fortune which confirmed my belief.
I had returned to my residence and had just entered my room in order to rest up a bit from the walk when I found on my table an open book which I had not left there. It was the works of the philosopher Cardano. And even though I had no intention of reading it, my glance fell, as if under compulsion, precisely on one of the stories told by this philosopher. He writes that, while studying one evening by candlelight, he saw pass through the closed doors of his room two old men, both very tall, who, in response to his questions, indicated that they were inhabitants of the Moon. Having said this, they disappeared. I was so surprised, not only that the book had moved across the room by itself, but also by the timing of the occurrence and its having opened to one particular passage, that I took this entire sequence of incidents as an inspiration from God, telling me to inform men that the Moon is a world.
"What?," said I to myself. "After having spoken about this thing on this very day, it happens that a book, perhaps the only one in the world on this topic, flies from my shelf onto my table and seems to become capable of reason so as open itself to the very place telling of such a marvelous adventure and giving my fantasy matter for reflection and my will a plan of action!. . .Without a doubt," I continued, "the two old men who appeared to this great philosopher are the same two who have moved my book and opened it to this very page, to save them from having to make another speech like the one they delivered to him."
"But," I added, "Will I ever be able to clear away my doubts unless I go there myself?"
"And why not?" I answered myself immediately. "After all, in olden days Prometheus went to the heavens to steal fire."
These waves of feverish thought soon gave way to the hope that such a trip might be successfully undertaken. In order to come up with a plan I shut myself away in an isolated house in the country. After having dreamed at length of various different ways of reaching my goal, here is how I undertook to reach the heavens.
I filled some vials with dew and attached them to my body. Since dew is attracted by the heat of the Sun, I soon found myself above the highest clouds. But the Sun's attraction raised me rather too quickly and instead of drawing near to the Moon, as I had hoped, I seemed to have moved farther away from it. So, I broke a number of the vials until I could feel that my own weight was overcoming the Sun's attraction and I began to sink back toward the Earth. My impression was not mistaken, for a short time later I fell to the ground. Counting from the time I had taken off, I surmised that it must be about midnight. Nevertheless, I could see that the sun was, in fact, at its highest point above the horizon, and that it was, therefore, midday. You can imagine how surprised I was. Indeed, I was so astonished that, knowing no other reason for what had come to pass, I had the insolence to assume that God looked favorably on my daring, and had once more stopped the Sun in the heavens, in order to provide light for my heroic enterprise.
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