And this seems to be the philosophy of the people on the Moon and on Mars, as we figured it out.
Now the machine has been switched on and on the screen we are viewing the picture of the Triton race. They were very tall, handsome people. We would judge the average was six feet tall or a little better and well built in proportion to their height; almost like one. Most of them were brunette but here and there we could see one who was more of a blonde. By their expressions we could see they were very intelligent.
They did very little work, what we would call labor of any kind. They had machines to do everything for them. We might say that all the work they did each day, which the machines could not do, at best was two hours. The machines did the rest of the work.
Their buildings, homes, and cities in general seemed to possess something that a man can dream of but seldom at any time realize.
They really were masters over nature, as we could easily see. We could almost write a volume telling what we have seen on the screen.
As we watched this picture and its full import dawned upon us, we wanted to know how they can reproduce these happenings of millions of years in the past.
The reply was, "past is present, and present is also past. Nothing that ever was, is, or will be, can ever be erased from the archives of eternity. It is always present and whenever the proper conditions prevail, reproduction can take place. This machine is a proper condition that can reproduce things as you are seeing them, so that by studying the reproduction we can know what happened in the past and why it happened. This way mistakes can be detected. Since all forms and all things are nothing but various rates of actions, which are sometimes called vibrations, they remain in the vastness of space forever."
"For an example," and here he switched to another scene, the Earth, the recent war which we have gone through and the conditions we are going through now, "this is picked right out of space. Once it is picked, an indelible picture is made of it by this machine. This can be done not only of the Earth, but by this same method we scan all interstellar space, which includes all actions within it, involving trillions upon trillions of systems of planets as well, and the activities upon them."
Again he referred to our book of guidance in which is the promise that the Book of Remembrance shall be opened unto everyone.
"Someday," he said, "a race will rise upon the Earth that will live as people should live, and in time they probably will get such a machine as this one, which reveals all the past; or, should they be worthy of it, they will be given one by the Martonians who already have them."