Front matter · List of plates

Every figure,
set one word at a time.

No photographs, no clip art, no strokes: each instrument in this book is a single word, repeated until it holds the shape — the way type once held everything. A treatise opens with its list of plates; here is this one's.

Fig. I · avia perviathe rose of the course — the family motto, boxing its own compass.On the frontispiece →

Fig. II · curiositythe vessel — on the frontispiece it casts off, and mid-voyage it becomes a rocket.See it sail →

Fig. III · craftthe dividers — care on one point, repetition on the other.Chapter III →

Fig. IV · medicinethe rod of Asclepius — one serpent, one staff, five thousand years of practice.Chapter IV →

Fig. V · futurethe wave — it looks like a wall until you learn to read water.Chapter V →

Fig. VI · signalthe lighthouse — its whole job is to keep saying one true thing.Chapter VI →

Fig. VII · recordthe anchor — the voyage holds only if it is written down.Chapter VII →

Tailpiece · audacitythe match — a small wooden thing, until somebody strikes it.The admission →

Now read the book ≡The Frontispiece →Chapter III · The Works

Every figure,set one word at a time.

Every figure,
set one word at a time.