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r r
Brother Paul looked at him. "I don't understand. I had expected to meditate this hour." Meditation was
serious business: another form of learning.
"Indeed you shall, Paul," the Father said with a certain obscure smile. "You shall meditate whether to
open that folder or to let it be."
Was the Father joking? This was hardly the standard definition of meditation! Yet it seemed he was not.
"How shall I know what is right? I don't know the nature of this folder."
"It is your college transcript." And Father Benjamin departed.
Meditation? This was turmoil! Brother Paul knew this transcript was, for him, classified material; he was
not supposed to see it. In order to remove all competitive pressure, the college concealed the records from
the individual students. Of course, Paul knew generally how he had done, for his own opinions were part
of the record.
Now, however, he wondered. If he knew what was in his transcript, why should it be secret from him?
What difference did it make?
He pondered, and the doubt grew. No one kept his age a secret from him, or his weight, or any other
aspect of his own being or performance. Generally Brother Paul felt that any person had a right to
information about himself; it was after all his life. What purpose was there in a secret, ever?
But surely the college had reason to restrict this document. The pointless frills had been eliminated there
in favor of the genuine education. If some aspect had to be concealed, it was necessary. Wasn't he honor
bound to obey the rule and leave the folder alone?
Then why had Father Benjamin presented him with this material? Was this a test of his basic integrity,
whose result would determine his progress in the Order? Was Father Benjamin playing the Devil's
Advocate, subjecting him to temptation? Would he, like Jesus Christ, prevail and remain above reproach-
or would he, like Eve in the Garden of Eden, succumb to the lure of the fruit of the forbidden Tree of
Knowledge?
That introduced another aspect. Brother Paul himself had never condemned Eve for tasting that fruit,
though it had cost her and Adam their residence in an earthly paradise. Knowledge was the very essence
of man, the thing that distinguished him from the animals. A person who eschewed learning of any type
sacrificed his heritage. Eden had been no paradise; it had been a prison. Ignorance was not bliss. Surely
God had intended the ancestral couple to eat of the fruit; it would have been wrong not to do it. The point
of the legend was that the price of knowledge was high-but it had to be paid. The alternative would have
been to remain an animal.
This was not, perhaps, an orthodox interpretation. But the Holy Order of Vision, like the college,
encouraged widely ranging thought. If man's insatiable curiosity were the Original Sin, how could he
expiate it, except by finally satisfying it?
Was it significant that Satan had tempted Christ with power, wealth, and pride, but not with knowledge?
"If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread." Jesus had responded: "Man shall
not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God." And to the offer of
worldly power if he would worship the Devil: "Get thee behind me, Satan& " Why not knowledge?
He looked at the folder again. The thing seemed to glow with evil light despite his reasoning. Could it be
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r r
that knowledge was power and, therefore, had been included in the temptations Christ withstood? What
had Father Benjamin done to him, putting this manifestation of the Devil within his grasp?
No, he had no Biblical reference here. The verdict on knowledge was inconclusive. Each specific case
had to be judged on its merits.
By what right did the college decree that everyone except the person most concerned should know the
details of his education? There was an inherent unfairness in that which should be manifest to any
objective person. By what irony were the educators themselves blind to this wrong?
Yet he knew from his experience that educators were human too, with human assets and failings. They
did not see right and wrong with perfect clarity. And why should they? Their purpose was to enable the
students to grow; if they succeeded in this, they had met the requirement of their office. Could God
himself demand more of them? Probably it had been the college administrators, not the instructors, who
had classified the documents.
But again: why! So the students could not complain? Why should any student complain about the simple
record of his progress that he himself had helped write? Something was missing&
He remembered his encounters with Exec and with the Vice Squad. Secrecy had been the hallmark of
illicit dealings there. Secrecy was so often invoked to protect the guilty.
Was it the simple record? Or was there some sinister secret buried in this folder, known to all except him?
Brother Paul recalled the frustrating joke about the man who was given a message written in a foreign
language. Each person to whom he took it, who was able to read that language, refused either to tell him
its meaning or to associate with him further. Thus the man remained forever in doubt. Was this college
transcript like that? Surely he should find out!
He reached for it-but his hand hesitated. Did the end justify the means? The end was enlightenment, but
the means was the violation of someone's trust. The college was a mere institution, true-but trust was
trust. It did not matter what dark secrets lurked within this folder; the unveiling of them would be a
personal sin, an affront against morality, lightness, and justice.
"Ah, but the flesh is weak," Paul murmured, opening the folder.
Soon he wished he had not. Yea, Pandora! he thought. Pandora was the girl who had opened the box
(was she merely another incarnation of Eve?) and thereby loosed all things upon the world, retaining only
one: hope. Paul had now let hope itself escape. For the cherished ideals of his college days, that had
survived all the buffeting of campus politics, flawed faculty members, and a questionable suspension,
were now revealed as delusions.
First, this transcript had grades. Straight letter grades, A, B, C, of precisely the type the college never
used. Oh, there were paragraph evaluations too-but each was followed by its translation into the letter, the
kind that computers could manipulate for numeric grade point averages, just as at any other school. But at
other schools the grades were posted openly; each student knew exactly where he stood. Here they had
been posted secretly so that not only was the student not advised of his rating, but he did not even know
that he was being graded. Thus he was at a competitive disadvantage in the remainder of his life. As
though he were playing poker and every other player could see his hand, but he could not. Brother Paul
understood poker all too well, and the analogy tortured him. Here was his message in a foreign language,
and of all the parties who could have revealed its content to him, only one had done so: the Holy Order of
Vision. Thus he had broken the terrible geas more or less by luck. Yet its prior damage could not be
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r r [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]