TheFlat Middle-earth Society

What we hold

Four articles, plainly stated

1. Article the First

   The world was made flat

   It was laid down level. It had an edge, and a sea that ran to that edge, and beyond the edge a dark that was nobody's business. Among those who have read the older maps this is not in dispute. It is only in dispute among those who have read the newer ones.

2. Article the Second

   The Bending was policy, not weather

   We are told the world was folded into a ball as a punishment. Punishment of whom? The offending island was already at the bottom of the sea by then. You do not curve an entire world to discipline a drowned man. You curve it so that nobody can walk to the rim and check.

3. Article the Third

   The Straight Road is still there

   The old level way still runs out past where the rim used to be. It has not been closed. It has been de-listed — removed first from the maps, then from the songs, and finally from the curriculum, in that order, which is the order these things always go in.

4. Article the Fourth

   Every round map is a copy of a copy

   Ask your cartographer when he last saw the curve of the world with his own eyes. He has not. He copied a man who copied a man. We are not accusing him of malice. We are accusing him of tracing.

Correspondence

Objections, answered

I have sailed west and returned from the east.

You sailed in a circle. A circle is a flat shape. We thank you for the confirmation and have added your voyage to our evidence.

The horizon plainly curves.

So does a long table, to a man lying on it. Stand up and try again.

The Powers themselves bent the world. It is written down.

We do not dispute that it was bent. We dispute that it was always bent. Read your own sentence back slowly and you will find you agree with us.

You are a group of adults in costume at a Renaissance faire.

We are. We are also correct. The two have never been in conflict.