Marsh-wigglian philosophy

(or "You can learn a lot about the world around you from a fictional character")

In the climax of C.S. Lewis' The Silver Chair, Jill Pole, Eustace Scrubb, and their Marsh-wiggle guide, Puddleglum had just released Prince Rilian from his decade-long enchantment, when the witch, the Lady of the Green Kirtle, returned to her underworld castle. Despite the ruse of the quartet that Rilian remained under her spell, the witch assessee otherwise and begian to beguile the lot of them.

The potency of her magic? Her incense and the steady, monotonous strumming on her mandolin got them all fuzzy-headed, but her lies began to bind them under her spell. "Do you really know what you know?" Soon she had them doubting the beauty and reality of Rilian's Narnian homeland, convincing them that all that there was was this dark, cavernous underland.

"There is no place called Naria."

"Yes there is though, Ma'am," said Puddleglum. "You see, I happen to have lived there all my life."

"Indeed," said the Witch. "Tell me, I pray you, where that country is?"

"Up there," said Puddleglum, stoutly, pointing overhead. "I -- I don't know exactly where."

"How?" said the Queen, with a kind, soft, musical laugh, "Is there a country up among the stones and mortar of the roof?"

"No," said Puddleglum, struggling a little to get his breath. "It's in Overworld."

"And what, or where, pray is this...how do you call it Overworld?"

On went the thrumming on the mandolin, on continued the deceptions, until Rilian, Jill, and Eustace had succumbed to an entranced sleep. At that point, Puddleglum summoned the last vestige of his sanity and plunged his foot into the fireplace. Not only did this heroic act raise such a stench as to counter the incense and roust the sleepers, but it brought lightning sobriety to Puddleglum's mind.

At this point, C.S. Lewis focused the laser beam of his scholarly mind, a mind that had been transformed by his relationship with Jesus Christ, upon the retort of the humble Marsh-wiggle.

"One word, Ma'am," he said, coming back from the fire; limping, because of the pain. "One word. All you've been saying is quite right, I shouldn't wonder. I'm a chap who always liked to know the worst and then put the best face I can on it. So I won't deny any of what you said. But there's one thing more to be said, even so. Suppose we have only dreamed, or made up, all those things--trees and grass and sun and moon and stars and Aslan himself. Suppose we have. Then all I can say is that, in that case, the made-up things seem a good deal more important than the real ones. Suppose this black pit of a kingdom of yours is the only world. Well, it strikes me as a pretty poor one. And that's a funny thing, when you come to think of it. We're just babies making up a game, if you're right. But four babies playing a game can make a play-world which licks your real world hollow. That's why I'm going to stand by the play-world. I'm on Aslan's side even if there isn't any Aslan to lead it. I'm going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn't any Narnia. So, thanking you kindly for our supper, if these two gentlemen and the young lady are ready, we're leaving your court at once and setting out in the dark to spend our lives looking for Overland. Not that our lives will be very long, I should think; but that's small loss if the world's as dull a place as you say."

Folks continue to posit a world and universe that have come about through machinistic means. Pah. I'm sticking with the Marsh-wiggle and clinging to the Lion and the true Word he has given us.