Part I. Philadelphia's Eastern State Penitentiary, 1829: Experiment in Silence -- Man of Sorrows -- Benjamin Rush's Vision -- Good by Discipline -- John Haviland's Star of Solitudes -- Part II. The Monastic World: A History of Silence -- In Proportion -- Speech and Silence -- Thomas Merton: Silence and the World -- Measures of Time -- The Voices of the Pages -- The Great Silence -- Part III. Philadelphia: Darkening the Dark -- Night in Stone -- "I get up and hammer my leather." -- Punishment Within Punishment -- "So that it may uplift ..." -- Time Again -- Part IV. The Silence of Women -- Silencing Silence -- "Or perhaps women ..." -- Monastic Women: More Shadow Than Light -- Part V. The Ends of Silence -- Thomas Merton: Questioning Silence -- The Monastic World: What Remains -- The Prison Cell in Our Time -- Intervals of Silence -- Coda -- In Ruins.