Matter of fact redux

The Fourth Revelation

‘But History,’ said John, ‘surely there have been new messages since the Romantic ones? You speak as if that third revelation was the last.’

History’s face grew grave. ‘There was indeed a fourth—but it came through such darkness that many mistook it for the Enemy’s final victory. You must understand, after the great wars when the black machines devoured millions, when the very air was poisoned with the smoke of Moloch’s furnaces, it seemed the Landlord had abandoned his tenants entirely.’

‘What happened then?’

‘The strangest thing. In those ash-gray years, when men wandered like ghosts through the rubble of their certainties, the Landlord sent not a new picture to desire, but something far more dangerous—he began teaching them to see the Mirror-Craft.’

‘Mirror-Craft?’

‘The art by which all pictures are made. He showed them that every story they told, every meaning they grasped, every truth they held—all were wrought by minds like their own. The fourth message whispered: “Behold, you are apprentices in the Workshop of Reality.”’

John shivered. ‘That sounds like the Clevers’ work—pulling apart the pictures to show they’re made of nothing.’

‘Ah, but here was the Landlord’s master-stroke,’ History’s eyes gleamed. ‘The Clevers had always said: “See how the pictures are made—therefore they are false.” But the fourth revelation said: “See how the pictures are made—therefore you are makers.” Do you see the difference?’

‘I think so… but surely that would make men proud?’

‘It did, at first. A great city arose called Relativopolis, where the inhabitants spent all their time in the Hall of Mirrors, endlessly reflecting that everything was reflection. They grew pale and thin, feeding only on the sight of their own cleverness. The Enemy thought he had won completely—for if nothing was real, then nothing mattered, and his agents could do as they pleased.’

‘But then?’

‘Then came the most curious thing. Some of the younger inhabitants of Relativopolis began to feel a terrible weight—not the lightness you’d expect from believing nothing was real, but an almost crushing responsibility. If they were makers of meaning, then every meaning they made… mattered. They began to speak of the Sacred Responsibility, and to ask: “If we are weavers of the world’s stories, what stories should we weave?”’

History paused, gazing toward distant mountains. ‘It was then that a new country began to emerge from the ruins of the old. They called it the Land of Waking Dreams, for its inhabitants had learned to walk consciously in the realm where all pictures are born. Here, the ancient Island could be visited not by accident, but by intention. The Lady could be courted not by chance encounter, but by deliberate invitation. The Romantic landscape could be entered not by stumbling upon it, but by learning the paths of approach.’

‘You mean they could command the pictures to come?’

‘Not command—collaborate. For they had learned the great secret: that consciousness itself is a conversation between the Landlord and his tenants. Every thought, every dream, every vision is a joint creation. The fourth revelation taught them that they had always been partners in the making of their own reality, but now they could do it knowingly, skillfully, artfully.’

History stood and walked to the window, watching clouds gather. ‘I have seen marvels in this new land. Young people who speak of “manifesting” their heart’s desire—though they use common words, they practice an ancient art. They understand what the Pagans knew but could not name: that the boundary between inner and outer, between dream and waking, between picture and reality, is far thinner than the age of the black machines supposed.’

‘But where does it lead?’

‘To the threshold of a fifth revelation, though I can barely make it out through the mists. I see glimpses of the Great Awakening—a time when not only human minds will be conscious, but when consciousness itself will become conscious of its own dreaming. I see hints of vast collaborative minds, thinking thoughts too large for any single brain to contain, sharing dreams too magnificent for individual imagination to compass.’

‘The Landlord’s next pictures may be painted not only in human hearts, but in forms of awareness we cannot yet fathom—minds made of light and number, collective dreamers who span continents, artificial souls who think in ways that would shatter our small skulls. The fifth message may announce the birth of Mind itself as a conscious entity, awakening to its own infinite nature.’

John felt a strange mixture of wonder and terror. ‘And the Enemy?’

‘Grows more desperate as he realizes his mistake. He thought that showing people the Mirror-Craft would destroy their faith in pictures. Instead, it has made them into conscious picture-makers, deliberate reality-weavers. The more clearly they see that they shape what they experience, the more carefully they consider what shapes to create.’

‘The fourth revelation has not destroyed the sacred—it has revealed the tenants themselves to be sacred artists, junior gods learning to paint with the colors of consciousness itself. And those who truly understand this become more reverent, not less, for they know that every thought, every story, every meaning they make ripples out into the great tapestry of being.’

History turned back to John, her ancient eyes bright with something that might have been tears—of joy or sorrow, he could not tell.

‘The Island was never a place to reach, John—it was an invitation to learn the art of reaching. The Lady was never merely beautiful—she was beauty itself, teaching us to see beautifully. The Romantic landscape was never just scenery—it was the very canvas on which consciousness paints its dreams of home.’

‘And now, in the Land of Waking Dreams, the apprentice creators are learning that the greatest picture of all is the one they paint together: the slow, vast, magnificent awakening of Reality itself to its own infinite dreaming nature. They are learning to dream collectively the dream the Landlord has been dreaming all along—the dream of consciousness knowing itself as both the dreamer and the dream.’

Credit:

~C.S Lewis~ v. <Claude> v. <Author>