“The Next Millenium: A Voice from the Distant Past” by Harvey Ardman

As we progress through the centuries, a passel of prophets, prognosticators, and pundits are trying to predict what the next ones might bring. So, it might be instructive for these folk to look back at the little-known letter Merlin wrote to King Arthur on December 31,999, in which he discussed his thoughts about the First Millennium and the millennium that lay ahead.

At great expense and considerable personal risk, I have managed to unearth the last remaining copy of this letter from the ruins of Arthur’s castle in Camelot. I present it herewith, translated into the modern idiom from the original Anglo-Saxon.

Dear Arthur,

Some calendar makers don’t agree, but according to MY calculations, January 1 will mark the year 1000, which means Christ was born one millennium ago more or less. Since a thousand years is such a nice round number—hey, guy, quadruple digits!—I thought this might be the right moment to take stock of our progress and look at our future.

To be brutally honest, Arthur, this hasn’t exactly been a banner millennium. We have forgotten half of what we knew when it started. Who remembers Plato? Who can still quote Aristotle? The Priests have managed to convince everyone that the sun revolves around the Earth, even though Ptolemy long ago proved otherwise. We’ve lost God knows how much literature. The Goths destroyed the Roman Empire. Half the roads the Romans built in Britain are nothing more than potholes. We still have no idea what causes diseases and even our best minds have been unable to turn dross into gold.

Let’s face it, outside of Camelot (and Charlemagne’s dynasty in France), the civilized world is a mess. We don’t really have countries, we have Lords in castles, vassals in villages, and serfs on the farms. And frankly, I don’t envy vassals and serfs. How would you like it, Arthur, spending every day in the fields, tilling, tilling and tilling—no horseback riding, no jousts, no hours of lounging around the Round Table, shooting the bull with your buddies, and no eating legs of mutton with your bare hands?

I know what you’re thinking, Arthur—religion is the answer. The Pope and the Priests will bring law and order to the world. Get serious. The chances of that happening are somewhere between none—and what’s that Arabic term?—oh yes, zero. You know the Priests. They are the most stubborn creatures in God’s universe. It’s their way or the highway. They think they’re infallible. Give me a break. Next thing you know, they’ll ask you to send the Knights of the Round Table on some stupid mission to batter the heathens into submission. Do you have any idea how many heathens there are?

The way I see it, Arthur, church and state have royally screwed up the First Millennium, if you’ll excuse the expression. I say they’ve had their shot. I don’t want to blow my own horn, but I think the time has come to let the magicians take the reins. And the alchemists, the philosophers, the wizards, the enchantresses, the sages, and the bards. My people, that is.

I’m not saying we’ll totally eliminate wars and plagues—who knows, we may even cause some—but I think no one has a better chance of energizing the human race and putting it on the right path. I think it’s time to leave the tilling of the fields to the oxen, restrict religion to matters of worship, and pension off the kings. After your reign, of course.

Give us our thousand years. If we can’t get civilization moving again by 1999, well, who knows, maybe we should turn the whole mess over to the strolling players, the grapplers and the highwaymen.

As I recall, you often said I was an old windbag, and maybe that’s all this is more wind. But those are my thoughts on this numerically auspicious day.

By the way, I won’t be coming for the Holidays. I don’t mind dining with the Knights of the Round Table, of course, but I can’t imagine breaking bread with that insufferable offspring of yours, Mordred.

Please keep Excalibur well-polished. And give my best to Gwen and Lance. Does he still see that scullery maid?

Yours for a better future,

MERLIN


Harvey Ardman has been a writer all his life and a freelancer and author since 1961. He holds degrees in journalism from Northwestern University and Columbia Graduate School of Journalism. He has published 23 books, written for many magazines, and written dozens of documentary TV shows for PBS and other outlets. Three years ago, he moved from his long time home on the coast of Maine to the Central Coast of California, where he could keep an eye on his youngest daughter and she could do the same for him.