A Heritage of Stars Read Free Page A

would dictate their reaction to a situation such as the destruction of a technological society. Most would react in anger, despair and fear, taking a short-term view of the situation. A few, perhaps a very few, would be inclined to take the long-term view. In a university community the inclination would be to take a long-range view, looking not so much at the present moment but at the impact of the moment ten years from the present, or perhaps a century into the future. A university or college community, under conditions that existed before the breakup came, would have been a loosely knitted group, although perhaps more closely knitted than many of its members would have been willing to admit. All would have been inclined to regard themselves as rampant individualists, but when it came down to the crunch, most would have been brought to the realization that underlying all the fancied individualism lay a common way of thought. Instead of running and hiding, as would be the case with those who took the short-range view, a university community would have soon realized that the best course would be to stay where they were and attempt, in the midst of chaos, to form a social order based so far as possible upon the traditional values that institutions of higher learning had held throughout the years. Small areas of security and sanity, they would have reminded themselves, had persisted historically in other times of trouble. Most, when they thought of this, would have thought of the monasteries that existed as islands of tranquillity through the time of Europe’s Dark Ages. Naturally, there would have been some who talked loftily of holding high the torch of learning as night fell upon the rest of mankind and there may even have been those who sincerely believed what they were saying. But, by and large, the decision would have been generally recognized as a simple matter of survival—the selection of a pattern that held a good chance of survival .
    Even here, there must have been a period of stress and confusion during those early years when the destructive forces were leveling the scientific and technological centers on the campus and editing books in the libraries to eliminate all significant mention of technology. It may have been that in the heated enthusiasm of the destruction certain faculty members associated with the hated institutions may have met their deaths. The thought even occurs that certain members of the faculty may have played a part in the destruction. Reluctant as one may be to think so, it must be recognized that in that older faculty body, intense and dedicated men and women built up storied animosities, based on conflicts of principles and beliefs, with these sometimes heightened by clashing personalities .
    Once the destruction was done, however, the university community, or what was left of it, must have pulled together again, burying whatever old differences that might still exist, and set about the work of establishing an enclave that stood apart from the rest of the world, designed to preserve at least some fraction of human sanity. Times would have been perilous for many years, as the protective wall built above this small segment of the campus must testify. The building of the wall would have been a long and arduous chore, but sufficiently effective leadership must have emerged to see that it was done. The university, during this period, probably was the target of many sporadic forays, although undoubtedly the dedicated looting of the city across the river and the other city to the east may have distracted some of the pressure on the campus. The contents of the stores, the shops, the homes within the cities, probably were far more attractive than anything the campus had to offer .
    Since there are no communications with the world outside the wall and all the news we get are the tales told by occasional travelers, we cannot pretend to know what may be happening otherwhere than here. Many events