But the expansion of which I speak was much more evil than all this.  I have remarked that the materialist, like the madman, is in prison; in the prison of one thought.  These people seemed to think it singularly inspiring to keep on saying that the prison was very large.  The size of this scientific universe gave one no novelty, no relief.  The cosmos went on for ever, but not in its wildest constellation could there be anything really interesting; anything, for instance, such as forgiveness or free will.  The grandeur or infinity of the secret of its cosmos added nothing to it.  It was like telling a prisoner in Reading gaol that he would be glad to hear that the gaol now covered half the county.  The warder would have nothing to show the man except more and more long corridors of stone lit by ghastly lights and empty of all that is human.  So these expanders of the universe had nothing to show us except more and more infinite corridors of space lit by ghastly suns and empty of all that is divine.

In fairyland there had been a real law; a law that could be broken, for the definition of a law is something that can be broken.  But the machinery of this cosmic prison was something that could not be broken; for we ourselves were only a part of its machinery.  We were either unable to do things or we were destined to do them.  The idea of the mystical condition quite disappeared; one can neither have the firmness of keeping laws nor the fun of breaking them.  The largeness of this universe had nothing of that freshness and airy outbreak which we have praised in the universe of the poet.  This modern universe is literally an empire; that is, it is vast, but it is not free.  One went into larger and larger windowless rooms, rooms big with Babylonian perspective; but one never found the smallest window or a whisper of outer air.

Their infernal parallels seemed to expand with distance; but for me all good things come to a point, swords for instance.  So finding the boast of the big cosmos so unsatisfactory to my emotions I began to argue about it a little; and I soon found that the whole attitude was even shallower than could have been expected.  According to these people the cosmos was one thing since it had one unbroken rule.  Only (they would say) while it is one thing it is also the only thing there is.  Why, then, should one worry particularly to call it large?  There is nothing to compare it with.  It would be just as sensible to call it small.  A man may say, “I like this vast cosmos, with its throng of stars and its crowd of varied creatures.”  But if it comes to that why should not a man say, “I like this cosy little cosmos, with its decent number of stars and as neat a provision of live stock as I wish to see”?  One is as good as the other; they are both mere sentiments.  It is mere sentiment to rejoice that the sun is larger than the earth; it is quite as sane a sentiment to rejoice that the sun is no larger than it is.  A man chooses to have an emotion about the largeness of the world; why should he not choose to have an emotion about its smallness?