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The setting is a timeless, shadowy void. Isaac Newton sits at a desk, a compass in hand, illuminated by a single, sharp beam of light. Across from him, William Blake stands in a swirling mist of his own watercolors, his eyes wide as if seeing through the very fabric of the room.
On the desk between them lies The Master and His Emissary.
Newton: (Adjusting his wig, voice precise) I have perused this Dr. McGilchrist’s volume, Mr. Blake. While his prose is unnecessarily florid, his observation of the "Emissary" is merely a description of the Method. To understand the clockwork of the Creator, one must take the gears apart. The Left Hemisphere, as he calls it, is the seat of clarity. It provides the discrete data required for universal laws. Without the "grasping" hand of the Emissary, we are but children lost in a fog.
Blake: (Pacing, hands gesturing wildly) A fog? No, Sir Isaac! You are the one in the fog! You sit in your "Single Vision" and call it light! McGilchrist speaks of you—not by name, but by spirit. You have taken the living, breathing Body of God and sliced it into cold, dead atoms. The Emissary is a usurper. He sees the rainbow and speaks of refraction; he sees the sun and speaks of a disc of fire. He does not see that the sun is a Heavenly Host crying "Holy, Holy, Holy!"
Newton: (Sighing) "Holy" is not a measurement, Mr. Blake. To say the sun is a "Host" tells me nothing of its mass, its distance, or the gravity it exerts upon the Earth. The Emissary—the Left Hemisphere—is the one who builds the telescope. It is the one who maps the stars so the sailor does not drown. You despise the very tools that keep the world orderly. McGilchrist admits the Emissary is necessary for action.
Blake: Necessary, yes! As a servant! As a cobbler to the King! But McGilchrist’s warning is that the cobbler has locked the King in the cellar. You have made a desert and called it Peace. You see the world as "parts," but the Master—the Right Hemisphere—knows that the whole is not merely the sum of parts. When you analyze a bird, the flight is gone. When you analyze a poem, the beauty vanishes. You are the "Urizen" of this book, Isaac—the cold architect of a mental prison!
Newton: (Points to a diagram in the book) And yet, look at the evidence. The author notes that the Left Hemisphere is the one with the gift of language and logic. It is the hemisphere of the "Map." Without the map, there is only "Vague Presence." How can a man live in a Vague Presence? To exist is to define. To define is to exclude. I exclude the "Heavenly Host" to find the Gravity.
Blake: (Leaning over the table, eyes burning) But the Map is not the Territory! That is the tragedy of your "Enlightenment." You have mistaken the lines on your parchment for the pulse of the Earth. McGilchrist says the Left Hemisphere is "narcissistic." It only likes what it has made itself. It likes your equations because your equations are a mirror of your own rigid mind. The Right Hemisphere—the Master—is the only window to the Other. To the Divine. To that which we did not invent!
Newton: (A flicker of irritation) The Dr. suggests that my way of thinking leads to a "hall of mirrors." He claims that by prioritizing the analytical, we lose the "Between-ness" of things. But tell me, Blake—can your "Between-ness" calculate the return of a comet? Can your "Master" prevent a bridge from collapsing?
Blake: It can do something far greater, Isaac. It can tell you why the bridge should be built at all. It can tell you that the comet is a sign of wonder, not just a ball of ice. You offer a world of "How," but you have murdered the "Why." You have created a society of "manipulators" who know how to use everything but value nothing. We are becoming the "Emissary’s" slaves, living in a world of icons and screens, exactly as the Good Doctor fears.
Newton: (Closing the book slowly) He does argue that the Emissary believes he is the whole. That he lacks the humility to know what he does not know. Perhaps... perhaps the calculus is not the soul.
Blake: (Softening, reaching out a hand) The calculus is the garment, Isaac. A fine garment, indeed. But do not mistake the clothes for the Man. The Master sees the Man; the Emissary only measures the sleeve. We must return to the "Four-fold Vision." We must let the Master lead, so that the Emissary’s work might actually mean something.