i 
 “YOU are s ad!”! the Knight s
aid, in an  
anxious tone: “let me sing y
ou a song to 
comfort you.”* 
“Is it very long?”  Alice asked. 
“It’s long,” said the Knight, but 
it’s  
very very beautiful.  The name of the song is 
called ‘The Book of the Beast.’ ” 
“Oh! how ugly” cried Alice. 
“Never m ind,” s aid the mild creature.  
“Some people call it ‘Reason in Rhyme.’ ” 
“But which is the name of 
the song?”  
Alice said, trying not to seem too interested. 
“Ah, you don’t understand,” the Knight 
said, looking a little vexed.  “That’s what the 
name is 
called.  The nam
e really  is 
‘Ascension Day  and Pentecost; with some 
Prose Essay s and an Epilogue,’ just as the 
title is ‘The Sword of Song’ y ou know, just 
in the sam e way, just in the sam e way, just 
in the same way  . . .” 
Alice put her fingers in her ears and gave  
a little scream .  “ Oh, dear me!  That’s  
 
* This passage is a parody on one in “Alice 
through the Looking-Glass.” 
harder than ever!” s he s aid to hers elf, and 
then, looking determ inedly intelligent: “So 
that’s what the song is called.  I see.  But 
what is the song?” 
“You must be a perfect fool,” 
said the 
Knight, irritably .  “The song is 
called  
‘Stout Doubt; or the Agnostic Anthology
,’  
by the author of ‘Gas Manipulation,’ ‘Solu-
tions,’ ‘The Management of Retorts,’ and 
other physical works of the first order—but 
that’s only what it’s called, you know.” 
“Well, wha t is the song 
then?” said  
Alice, who was by  this tim e completely be-
wildered. 
“If I wished to be obscure, child,” said 
 
the Knight, rather contemptuously, “I should 
tell you that the Name of the Title was ‘What 
a man of 95 ought to know,’ as endorsed by  
eminent divines, and that . . .”  Seeing 
that 
she only begin to cry , he broke off and con-
tinued in a gentler tone: “ it means, my dear  
. . .”  He stopped short, for she was taking 
 
no notice; but as her figure was bent by  sobs 
into som ething very  like a 
note of in-
terrogation: “You want to know what it 
is,  
 
CALLED BY CH
E BOOK OF THE BEAST 
1904 
 
TO MY OLD FRIEND AND COMRADE IN THE ART 
BHIKKU ANANDA METTEYA 
AND TO THOSE 
FOOLS 
WHO BY THEIR SHORT-SIGHTED STUPIDITY IN  
ATTEMPTING TO BOYCOTT THIS BOOK 
HAVE WITLESSLY AIDED THE 
CAUSE OF TRUTH 
I DEDICATE THESE MY BEST WORDS. 
[This book is so full of recondite knowledge of va
rious kinds that it seems quite ineffective  
to annotate every obscure passage.  Where refere
nces and explanations can be concisely given 
this has been done.] 
         
          SWORD OF SONG