There are three Dimensions of Space, through which man may move freely. And time is simply a Fourth Dimension: identical in every important characteristic to the others, except for the fact that our consciousness is compelled to travel along it at a steady pace, like the nib of my pen across this page.

If only — I had speculated, in the course of my studies into the peculiar properties of light — if only one could twist about the four Dimensions of Space and Time — transposing Length with Duration, say — then one could stroll through the corridors of History as easily as taking a cab into the West End!

The Plattnerite embedded in the substance of the Time Machine was the key to its operation; the Plattnerite enabled the machine to rotate, in an uncommon fashion, into a new configuration in the framework of Space and Time. Thus, spectators who watched the departure of the Time Machine — like my Writer — reported seeing the machine spin giddily, before vanishing from History; and thus the driver — myself — invariably suffered dizziness, induced by centrifugal and Coriolis forces which made it feel as if I were being thrown off the machine.

But for all these effects, the spin induced by the Plattnerite was of a different quality from the spinning of a top, or the slow revolution of the earth. The spinning sensations were flatly contradicted, for the driver, by the illusion of sitting quite still in the saddle, as time flickered past the machine — for it was a rotation out of Time and Space themselves.