The Point of View | Page 2

very intelligent year, a jewel in the crown of
civilization. Not only was the Morell prize given to van Manderpootz,
but I announced my discrete field theory in that year, and the
University unveiled Gogli's statue of me as well." He sighed. "Yes, a
very intelligent year! What do you think?"

"It depends on how you look at it," I responded glumly. "I didn't enjoy
it so much, what with Joanna Caldwell and Denise d'Agrion, and your
infernal experiments. It's all in the point of view."
The professor snorted. "Infernal experiments, eh! Point of view! Of
course it's all in the point of view. Even Einstein's simple little
synthesis was enough to prove that. If the whole world could adopt an
intelligent and admirable point of view--that of van Manderpootz, for
instance--all troubles would be over. If it were possible--" He paused,
and an expression of amazed wonder spread over his ruddy face.
"What's the matter?" I asked.
"Matter? I am astonished! The astounding depths of genius awe me. I
am overwhelmed with admiration at the incalculable mysteries of a
great mind."
"I don't get the drift."
"Dixon," he said impressively, "you have been privileged to look upon
an example of the workings of a genius. More than that, you have
planted the seed from which perhaps shall grow the towering tree of
thought. Incredible as it seems, you, Dixon Wells, have given van
Manderpootz an idea! It is thus that genius seizes upon the small, the
unimportant, the negligible, and turns it to its own grand purposes. I
stand awe-struck!"
"But what--?"
"Wait," said van Manderpootz, still in rapt admiration of the majesty of
his own mind. "When the tree bears fruit, you shall see it. Until then, be
satisfied that you have played a part in its planting."
* * * * *
It was perhaps a month before I saw van Manderpootz again, but one
bright spring evening his broad, rubicund face looked out of the
phone-screen at me.

"It's ready," he announced impressively.
"What is?"
The professor looked pained at the thought that I could have forgotten.
"The tree has borne fruit," he explained. "If you wish to drop over to
my quarters, we'll proceed to the laboratory and try it out. I do not set a
time, so that it will be utterly impossible for you to be late."
I ignored that last dig, but had a time been set, I would doubtless have
been even later than usual, for it was with some misgivings that I
induced myself to go at all. I still remembered the unpleasantness of
my last two experiences with the inventions of van Manderpootz.
However, at last we were seated in the small laboratory, while out in
the larger one the professor's technical assistant, Carter, puttered over
some device, and in the far corner his secretary, the plain and
unattractive Miss Fitch, transcribed lecture notes, for van Manderpootz
abhorred the thought that his golden utterances might be lost to
posterity. On the table between the professor and myself lay a curious
device, something that looked like a cross between a pair of
nose-glasses and a miner's lamp.
"There it is," said van Manderpootz proudly. "There lies my
attitudinizor, which may well become an epoch-making device."
"How? What does it do?"
"I will explain. The germ of the idea traces back to that remark of yours
about everything depending on the point of view. A very obvious
statement, of course, but genius seizes on the obvious and draws from it
the obscure. Thus the thoughts of even the simplest mind can suggest to
the man of genius his sublime conceptions, as is evident from the fact
that I got this idea from you."
"What idea?"
"Be patient. There is much you must understand first. You must realize
just how true is the statement that everything depends on the point of

view. Einstein proved that motion, space, and time depend on the
particular point of view of the observer, or as he expressed it, on the
scale of reference used. I go farther than that, infinitely farther. I
propound the theory that the observer is the point of view. I go even
beyond that, I maintain that the world itself is merely the point of
view!"
"Huh?"
"Look here," proceeded van Manderpootz. "It is obvious that the world
I see is entirely different from the one in which you live. It is equally
obvious that a strictly religious man occupies a different world than
that of a materialist. The fortunate man lives in a happy world; the
unfortunate man sees a world of misery. One man is happy with little,
another is miserable with much. Each sees the world from his own
point of view, which is the same as saying that each lives in