The Isis Papers: The Keys to the Colors

The I sis Papers
the great festival of destruction that they, the sane ones, have
prepared.
·n his nationwide best selling book, People
Psychiatrist M. Scott Peck, 1 E 'l contends II Science has also
Th H for Healing Human vt • '
of the Lie. e ope f il because of the immensity of the
steered clear of the problem o ehv body of scientific knowledge of
. 1 ed we do not yet ave a
mystery mvo v .... . h 1
II He also states,
human evil deserving of bemg called a psyc o ogy.
Caucasians seem to have fewer
Those of. us who ~~ blacks or Indians or Orientals than
comp~cu~n.s about kil~:; white men. It is easier for a white
we do m ktlhng our fe , d eck' The matter of the
1 h 'nigger' than a re n ....
man to ync a . . killing is yet another one
racial aspects of mtraspe~•es. . .
deserving significant scientific mvesugatiOn.
f · 1 pride
"War today is at least as much a matter o nauona
He cone 1 u d es,
as of racial pride."
. nee has steered clear of the subject
Even though Peck suggests that scte . lved II Herman Melville, the
ofevilbecauseofthe"immensemysterymvo ' . t1 thesub'ect
19th century novelist, pe.~ha~~ :~:n~c~eu:~~=~:::~ th~ ~bite w~le,
of evil. He approached evil g . . d him Ahab
. and the crippled white shtp captam who pursue , .
Moby Dtck, ed S tan) Melville uses an entire chapter of hts
(who is often compar to a · 11 H b · s
book to discourse on "The Whiteness of the Whale. e egm '
Wh . hale was to Ahab, has been hinted; what, at
What the tte w . . · d Aside from those
times, he was to me, as yet rematns u~sru . Dick which
mo re bvious considerations touchmg Moby • O
ak · any man's sou 1 some
could not but occasi~all~awgh:no~ rather vague, nameless
alarm, there wa~ anoh. er oh~ ch , at times by its intensity
horror concernmg tm, w t . al d
d all the rest; and yet so mystic ~
completely overpowere . th t I almost despair of putting ll m
well nigh ineffable was tt, a h' f the whale that
h 'bl form It was the w tteness o
a compre e~st e all. d me But how can I hope to explain
above all thmgs app e ·
Neurochemical Basis for Evil
myself here; and yet, in some dim, random way, explain myself
I must, else all these chapters might be naught.
Melville proceeds to detail many positive associations with whiteness:
"and though this pre-eminence in it [whiteness] applies to the human race
itself, giving the white man ideal mastership over every dusky tribe." He
continues,
.. .yet for all these accumulated associations, with whatever is
sweet, and honorable, and sublime, there yet lurks an elusive
something in the innermost idea of this hue, which strikes more
of panic to the soul than that redness which affrights in blood ....
That ghastly whiteness it is which imparts such an abhorrent
mildness even more loathsome than terrific, to the dumb
gloating of their aspect. So that not the fierce-fanged tiger in
his heraldic coat can so stagger courage as the white-shrouded
bear or shark.
Further on, Melville contemplates,
What is it that in the Albino man so peculiarly repels and often
shocks the eye, as that sometimes he is loathed by his own kith
and kin! It is that whiteness which invests him, a thing
expressed by the name he bears, The Albino is as well made as
other men - has no substantive deformity - and yet this mere
aspect of all-pervading whiteness makes him more strangely
hideous than the ugliest abortion. Why should this be so?
. Again referring to whiteness, Melville writes, " ... it is at once the most
meaning symbol of spiritual things, nay, the very veil of the Christian's
and yet should be as it is, the intensifying agent in things the most
"I'I""Uli&F, to mankind, 11
Melville's Captain Ahab sees the white whale as all evil of which he
in pursuit. In a letter to Nathaniel Hawthorne, Melville referred to Moby
as a "wicked book." My own interpretation of the symbolism in this
which has been regarded as the greatest of all American novels, is
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