My reason is convinced, answered the Marchioness; but my imagination is overwhelmed with such an infinite variety and number of inhabitants existing in each of the planets; for as there is no dull uniformity in nature, the difference of species must be in proportion to the number of beings--how can imagination grasp such a vast idea? Imagination, I replied, is not required to represent all this to us; we can penetrate no farther than we are assisted by our sight; we can only perceive, from a general glance, that nature has established an inconceivable diversity in her works. The human face is formed every where on the same plan, but still how great is the difference between the visages of Europeans and of Africans or Tartars: not only in separate nations do we find a distinguishing character of countenance, even among the same people every family seems formed from a distinct model. How astonishing is the power of nature in giving such variety to so simple an object! In the universe we are but as a little family whose faces resemble each other; the next planet contains another family who have a different style of countenance. Probably the variations are greater in proportion to the distance, and could we compare the inhabitants of the earth and moon, we should easily see that they were nearer neighbours than those of the earth and of Saturn. Here, for instance, our thoughts are made vocal; the people in another planet only express themselves by gestures; farther off, they may dispense with any sort of conversation. Here our reason is matured by experience; elsewhere experience may add little to the understanding; at a greater distance, children may know as much as old men. In this world we give ourselves more uneasiness about the future than the past; on another globe, the past afflicts more than the future; on a third, the people are neither distressed by one nor the other, and they perhaps are not the most unhappy. It is said that we are possibly in want of a sixth sense belonging to our nature, by means of which our knowledge would be greatly augmented. This sense is most likely in some other world, where one of our five is wanting. There may even be a very great number of natural senses, but in the distribution of them among the planets, only five have fallen to our share, and with these five we remain satisfied because we don't know of any more. Our sciences have certain limits which no human understanding has exceeded: at a particular point we stop, the rest is reserved for other worlds, where they are ignorant of many things that we know. This planet is blest with the delightful emotions of love, but at the same time desolated by the fury of war. Another enjoys perpetual tranquillity, but with this uninterrupted peace, love is unknown, and calmness degenerates into ennui. In short whatever nature has done on a small scale, for the distribution of happiness and talents among us,