“They say: ‘you would reduce us to the level of the necrophagous Earthlings, who from time immemorial have consumed the elements of their ancestors and friends and enemies alike, with beastly indifference’.”
“But,” I interrupted; “you know they are mistaken in this opinion of us. Only a few savages on earth are man eaters.”
“True,” said he, “but what they mean is, that from your manner of disposing of the dead, when they become decomposed, their elements are dispersed in the air and absorbed by the soil from which they pass into plants and finally become your food. I have heard a Lunarian say he would starve rather than eat a grain containing a molecule of nitrogen or carbon, that had once formed a part of one of his ancestors.”
“Well, I think that is the culmination of scrupulosity. I am glad such phenomenal squeamishness does not exist on this planet.”
“I do not defend it nor approve of it,” he replied, “any more than you do. But still I think your complacent congratulations of your own race rather out of place. You are quite as much under the dominion of indefensible ideas as we. For example, you have an ancient book whose doctrines and precepts you think you must accept and obey whether they are agreeable and suitable or not, although the men who gave them, have been dead two or three thousand years, while scarcely two of you agree as to what the precepts are and each generation has a different interpretation of them. You have a sect that believe that your Deity is mortally offended with all who do not submit to be immersed under water, while others think he will be satisfied with their having a few drops sprinkled on the face. You have sects that believe your Deity is greatly displeased to see people hopping around on their legs, or dancing as you call it, while one sect employ dancing as the most satisfactory mode of worshipping him. You have a sect that believe that pictures, music and ornaments, and coats with collars that turn down are offensive to the Deity, and who think he is best pleased with silent worship, while others think he likes to be flattered in loud speeches and louder songs addressed to himself, and that he is indifferent whether coat collars stand up or lie down. You have a sect that believe that buttons on the clothes are offensive to him and who therefore fasten their clothing with hooks and eyes. All these sects and many more equally absurd, get their various contradictory notions from the same book, and they adhere to them with such tenacity that in many cases they would die rather than give them up and would if they dared, murder other people for not accepting them, and in times past have done so in thousands of instances. In former times it was a common opinion, that your Deity had an arch enemy called the Devil, who opposed, bothered and thwarted him in the most provoking manner, and among other things inspired and aided thousands of unattractive old women to turn themselves into wolves, cats and other beasts and to become witches, and in these conditions to attack and injure their neighbors and bring strange diseases upon them. For these offenses these old women were judged by your sacred books and were burnt by the thousand. And yet many of the men of this generation, while still holding to the sacred books, have not only repudiated witchcraft, but even the devil himself, and an attempt to burn a witch would now be met by an insurrection. Then you have a sect, or a nation rather, of people, who claim that they are the peculiar favorites of your Deity, who chose them from among all the nations and set them apart as his own, and ordered them to practice a certain peculiar mutilation on the bodies of their children as an evidence and seal of his promises to them. No one of these people would consider himself entitled to hold up his head if it were not for his mutilation. Notwithstanding the claims of these peculiar people are admitted by the rest, no people on earth have been so despised, persecuted and maltreated as they. For over 2,000 years they have been kicked and cuffed about the earth, robbed, driven repeatedly from one country to another, and have never in all that time possessed the sovereignty of a single township. Then again your race believe they are made and formed in the very image and likeness of your Deity, yet you conceal that likeness with garments as if ashamed of it, and such are your notions of propriety that if a man should show this divine likeness in public, naked or even half naked, he would be sent to prison, or a mad house. And then consider the fashions of these garments. Those whose business it is to make clothes, constantly demand changes in the fashion, so as to secure more employment and profit for themselves, and whenever certain ones, who have appointed themselves to be the leaders, say the word, everybody feels obliged to procure new clothes of such sort as these leaders require, notwithstanding those they already have may be good, useful and becoming, and that those prescribed, may be hideous, unsuitable and unhealthful. Many of you are actually so infatuated with this bondage, that if you could not comply with its requirements, you would regard life as of no account.”
During the delivery of this tirade, the flashing eyes of my visitor showed how much his feeling was enlisted in the subject and during the whole time I continued to reproach myself for having started him off on such a rampage, by an unlucky, if not impertinent remark of my own. I was made to recall the adage that people who live in glass houses, should not engage in throwing stones; and it was forcibly shown me how very much “human nature” the Lunarians possess, since while he was willing to point out, criticise and condemn the follies of his own people, he would not allow an outsider to do it. I was greatly relieved when he paused and gave me an opportunity to change the subject, which I did with a precipitancy, that evidently amused him and brought back the good natured expression that habitually possessed his eyes. In fact I believe that the change I had observed was due to intellectual activity and was not accompanied by any real feeling of resentment or passion. Said I, “One of our wise men has expressed the opinion, that the people of the earth, are “maistly fules,” and I believe that most other wise men agree with him. So I beg you will waste no more of your precious time in arraigning our race, but go on with your intensely interesting and instructive account of your own race and your remarkable planet.” He thereupon goodnaturedly resumed.
“Organic existence must everywhere be to a great extent the same. The elements that enter into the composition of organisms, are subject to certain laws of chemical affinity, that demand their own conditions, and will not operate when these conditions are absent. The chief of these are furnished by the radiations of the sun in our solar system and no doubt by those of the stars in other systems. These radiations impressed upon organized materials become light and heat and where they are either in excess or deficiency organic development is not possible. These conditions obtain throughout the solar system, and no doubt in every system composed of the same sort of elements. But of the solar system we can speak with some confidence, for we have been able to visit a considerable part of it.
“The inhabitants of the different planets differ from each other in the same way that the various animal races of earth differ from each other. You have on earth four sub-kingdoms of intelligent animals; vertebrates, articulates, mollusks and radiates. These have all been evolved from a common worm-like ancestry, and each form possesses the potentiality of receiving an equally high development, both physically and mentally. The development of any of them in all cases depends upon the way they are impressed by their surroundings and the proper surroundings can develop high intelligence in either of the forms. On earth the highest development has happened to the vertebrate branch, but with us the articulates have always been the dominant branch, while the vertebrates have never attained to a condition above that of your salamanders and small lizards. The ascendant race with us as with you has always contributed to keep the others in the background, by destroying the most advanced and aggressive of them and pursuing them till none but the smallest, weakest and most harmless of their tribe remain. Indeed until this is done, the position of the ascendant race is not secure. Your own race has had experience of this in the struggle with and subjugation of other races. In the early history of the earth, it was for a long time doubtful whether it was to be dominated by the human family or by a tribe of reptiles. At that ancient period, a tribe of reptiles had become developed that walked erect on their hind legs, and whose fore limbs supported wings and terminated in excellent hands, having four fingers. There were several related families of these animals, some of which were almost or quite the equal of man in intelligence. The final triumph of man over these advanced reptiles, was due to his superior compact social organization. While they relied on their superior personal prowess and often fought single handed, men always fought in bands, and hung together in all their enterprises. The reptiles being finally vanquished and the tribes most advanced and most to be feared having been exterminated, the rest had two modes of escape. They could use their wings and thus by flight keep out of the way of their enemies or they could hide by crouching down in the grass and weeds and making themselves as small, sly and inconspicuous as possible. Some pursued one of these courses and some the other. The descendants of those that flew away gradually became developed into the birds as you now have them; while those that resorted to hiding and crouching down, were thus deprived of the opportunity to use their limbs generation after generation and so the limbs gradually became shrunken and useless, finally disappearing completely, or almost so, causing the body to come down flat on its belly on the ground, and thus were produced the serpents as you now have them.”
“No doubt,” said I, “the serpents originated in that way. They formerly possessed limbs, because many species still have the rudiments of them. In some cases these remnants show themselves like little hooks on the outside of the skin, while many others are covered up by the skin and are not seen at all. But all that retrogressive adaptation by which they lost their limbs, must have been practically completed before our race possessed any semblance of their present form and condition.”
“The earth,” he proceeded, “was full of contending races, and of course the backset that was imposed on the snakes, was contributed to by others, as well as men, but the latter were among the last and as regards the particular family of reptiles in question, the most formidable and effectual opponents. Some of your ancient traditions and literature contain allusions to this contest, the reptile being styled Nachash. You preserve an allusion to this ancient competition, in the legends of the Devil, who represents the reptile, and is often called the serpent etc. I recall this history, only to show you that the essential qualities of predominance do not inhere in any particular animal form. Your planet escaped the final domination of a reptile instead of a mammal, by only a little. As you have already perceived the dominant race on our planet is an articulate.”