The Time Machine
H. G. Wells
Public domain text from Project Gutenberg.
The Time Machine
An Invention
by H. G. Wells
CONTENTS
I Introduction
II The Machine
III The Time Traveller Returns
IV Time Travelling
V In the Golden Age
VI The Sunset of Mankind
VII A Sudden Shock
VIII Explanation
IX The Morlocks
X When Night Came
XI The Palace of Green Porcelain
XII In the Darkness
XIII The Trap of the White Sphinx
XIV The Further Vision
XV The Time Traveller s Return
XVI After the Story
Epilogue
I.
Introduction
1
The Time Traveller (for so it will be convenient to speak of him)
was expounding a recondite matter to us. His grey eyes shone and
twinkled, and his usually pale face was flushed and animated. The
fire burnt brightly, and the soft radiance of the incandescent
lights in the lilies of silver caught the bubbles that flashed and
passed in our glasses. Our chairs, being his patents, embraced and
caressed us rather than submitted to be sat upon, and there was that
luxurious after-dinner atmosphere, when thought runs gracefully free
of the trammels of precision. And he put it to us in this way marking
the points with a lean forefinger as we sat and lazily admired his
earnestness over this new paradox (as we thought it) and his fecundity.
You must follow me carefully. I shall have to controvert one or two
ideas that are almost universally accepted. The geometry, for instance,
they taught you at school is founded on a misconception.
Is not that rather a large thing to expect us to begin upon? said
Filby, an argumentative person with red hair.
I do not mean to ask you to accept anything without reasonable ground
for it. You will soon admit as much as I need from you. You know of
course that a mathematical line, a line of thickness _nil_, has no real
existe…