“I now wish to compare a few of your educational lessons with ours; but, before I proceed, let me again tell you that I do not mean to cast any reflections on your mode of living, on your manner of eating, on your style of dress, nor on your methods of teaching. I am fully convinced that you, the same as all other beings, are doing the best you have learned. I am also further convinced that we deserve no particular praise for our somewhat advanced stages of intellectual culture. All sentient beings are creatures of circumstances, over which they have no control. None of us can act beyond the sphere of our highest endowments. We must either act _within_ this limit or be quiescent. Our personal and ancestral environment impresses us with intelligence, and that organized intelligence is the motive force that impels all of _us_ and all of _you_ to act in accordance as we are connected with the chain of antecedents to our present being. A longer lapse of time and more favorable conditions have made us what we are, and, no doubt, the same conditions, as they come to pass on earth, will bring you where we are now on Mars. So please bear in mind that all the comments I shall make concerning your affairs and institutions are made from a sincere motive, and not with a view of casting reflections. “It is, no doubt, natural and good for the advancement of humanity on all planets that we all find greater delight in having our good qualities pointed out than we do in being reminded of our faults; but we must know our faults before we can consciously correct them, and with this view, I shall endeavor to make what I consider some of your faults, as conspicuous as possible, and I invite you to do the same with me. “Your system of education is too much confined to a cheerless building, which you call a school-house. That these public school-houses are unnatural, cheerless places, may be evidenced by the fact that scarcely any of your adults and parents ever visit them; for, if they were natural and agreeable, they certainly would. The management of your so-called school is too much in the hands of scheming politicians. You employ, as a rule, cruel, incompetent teachers. You resort to physical force--first, to support the public school by compulsory taxation; and, secondly, to procure the pupil’s attendance, both of which are, in our view, injurious, unjust and despotic. In a good system of education, the school-room is perfectly free, natural and co-extensive with the sphere of man’s activity. In a successful school every one is teacher and pupil at the same time. Now, in making these criticisms, let us begin at the foundation; let us look for the causes.