“Ah, my brother,” said he, “you are very little advanced in a knowledge of the properties of intelligence. I am here by a process as yet unknown to you, and which may be best described in your language as reflection. I am here by reflection. That is to say, my natural body is at my home, on the planet, which you call Mars. Its spiritual counterpart is here. You have already an inkling of this strange faculty of transferring intelligence, in some of the phenomena on which is founded your spiritualistic creed. We, of the planet Mars, have been in the enjoyment of this discovery for centuries; and while you of the Earth are only able by your appliances of science to measure the size of our planet, compute its distance, estimate the shape and extent of its orbit, and indulge in some vague conjectures appertaining to its condition, we have been making a close and interesting study of your social affairs, including, of course, your morals, politics and religion. You have only measured us as a planet. We have measured you as a people, and at least one of us, as you perceive, has mastered your language. Besides, our development is over ten thousand years ahead of yours. We can tell you more of your history than you know yourselves. At a period of yours described by your writers as the stone age, we had converted electricity into a motor and illuminating agent. I know your thoughts. You are surprised at what I have said, and wish me to tell you something of the planet upon which I reside. “It will interest you to know that about the equatorial regions of Mars is found its highest civilization and densest settlement. Your torrid zone, and the corresponding section of our planet, are widely different. In ours, the climate is delightfully and evenly temperate. The extent of our surface, as you know, is very much less than yours, but the uniform quality of our land for cultivation, and the smaller water surface, compared with yours, supports a population whose numbers would astonish you. You may as well discharge your mind of the many conjectures which ascribe to each planet a quality of matter and intelligence peculiar to itself. The whole universe is a unit, as your spectroscope, and the bodies from space that fall from time to time upon your surface, must have suggested to you. Variable states of density and temperature modify the forms and organs of animal and vegetable life, but matter is everywhere the same.