“Yet, my lord, I live while consciousness is not mine, while to all appearances I am a clod. And may not this same state of being, though but alternate with me, be continually that of many dumb, passive objects we so carelessly regard? Trust me, there are more things alive than those that crawl, or fly, or swim. Think you, my lord, there is no sensation in being a tree? feeling the sap in one’s boughs, the breeze in one’s foliage? think you it is nothing to be a world? one of a herd, bison-like, wending its way across boundless meadows of ether? In the sight of a fowl, that sees not our souls, what are our own tokens of animation? That we move, make a noise, have organs, pulses, and are compounded of fluids and solids. And all these are in this Mardi as a unit. Daily the slow, majestic throbbings of its heart are perceptible on the surface in the tides of the la-goon. Its rivers are its veins; when agonized, earthquakes are its throes; it shouts in the thunder, and weeps in the shower; and as the body of a bison is covered with hair, so Mardi is covered with grasses and vegetation, among which, we parasitical things do but crawl, vexing and tormenting the patient creature to which we cling. Nor yet, hath it recovered from the pain of the first foundation that was laid. Mardi is alive to its axis. When you pour water, does it not gurgle? When you strike a pearl shell, does it not ring? Think you there is no sensation in being a rock?—To exist, is to be; to be, is to be something: to be something, is—” “Go on,” said Media. “And what is it, to be something?” said Yoomy artlessly. “Bethink yourself of what went before,” said Media. “Lose not the thread,” said Mohi. “It has snapped,” said Babbalanja. “I breathe again,” said Mohi. “But what a stepping-off place you came to then, philosopher,” said Media. “By the way, is it not old Bardianna who says, that no Mardian should undertake to walk, without keeping one foot foremost?” “To return to the vagueness of the notion I have of myself,” said Babbalanja. “An appropriate theme,” said Media, “proceed.” “My lord,” murmured Mohi, “Is not this philosopher like a centipede? Cut off his head, and still he crawls.” “There are times when I fancy myself a lunatic,” resumed Babbalanja. “Ah, now he’s beginning to talk sense,” whispered Mohi. “Surely you forget, Babbalanja,” said Media. “How many more theories have you? First, you are possessed by a devil; then rent yourself out to the indweller; and now turn yourself into a mad-house. You are inconsistent.” “And for that very reason, my lord, not inconsistent; for the sum of my inconsistencies makes up my consistency. And to be consistent to one’s self, is often to be inconsistent to Mardi. Common consistency implies unchangeableness; but much of the wisdom here below lives in a state of transition.” “Ah!” murmured Mold, “my head goes round again.”