SECTION 9 Of the Universal Colour Bill

At a small party, the company was a pleasure to behold. The richly varied hues of the assembly in a church or theatre were said to have once distracted our greatest teachers and actors; but most ravishing of all was said to have been the unspeakable magnificence of a military review. The sight of a battle line of twenty thousand Isosceles, suddenly facing about, exchanging the sombre black of their bases for the orange of their acute angles; the militia of Equilateral Triangles tricoloured in red, white, and blue; the mauve, ultramarine, gamboge, and burnt umber of the Square artillerymen rotating near their vermilion guns; the flashing of the five-coloured and six-coloured Pentagons and Hexagons careering across the field in their roles as surgeons, geometricians, and aides-de-camp—these may have been sufficient to make the famous story of a Circle, overcome by the artistic beauty of his forces, throw aside his marshal’s baton and crown, and exclaim that he would exchange them for the artist’s pencil. The grandeur of these days is reflected in the very language of the period. Even the commonest citizens seemed to speak with richer words and thoughts, a legacy still felt in our finest poetry and even in the rhythm of modern scientific discourse.

Meanwhile, the intellectual arts were decaying. The Art of Sight Recognition, no longer needed, fell out of practice, and subjects like Geometry, Statics, and Kinetics were soon neglected at our University. The inferior Art of Feeling met a similar fate at our Elementary Schools. The Isosceles classes, asserting that the Specimens were no longer needed, grew more numerous and insolent, using their immunity from old educational burdens to advance their cause.

Year after year, soldiers and artisans asserted their equality with the highest Polygons, claiming that with the new Colour Recognition, there was no distinction between them and the aristocracy. Not content with neglecting Sight Recognition, they demanded the legal prohibition of all “monopolizing and aristocratic Arts,” calling for equal rights for all. They pushed for a Bill to force everyone, including Priests and Women, to be painted in certain colours. The idea was to ensure that, in certain positions, Women and Priests would appear identical, gaining respect and deference by their appearance.

This proposal was crafted not by an Isosceles but by an Irregular Circle, who, instead of being destroyed in childhood, brought havoc upon the country. The aim was to confuse the classes, making Priests and Women indistinguishable and undermining the authority of the Circles.

The Women, enticed by the promise of newfound respect, supported the Bill. The second goal of the Colour Bill was to demoralize the Circles, stripping them of their intellectual clarity and undermining their training in Sight Recognition. The proposal sought to diminish the intellectual strength of the Priestly Order and eventually dismantle the Aristocratic Legislature.