The Indianapolis journal., 1903-12-13
BY EDGAR SALTUS.

to talk the ability to do so must have sur
prised him. That. perhaps, is 25O,OOo years
| ago. Yet among the bushes of Borneo there
are beings that are his counterpart to-day.
When educated people come in contact with
these bushmen the latter feel that they
will not be understood. Educated people
understand them better than they under
stand themselves.
| 1t is the same way here. By comparison
with the Martians we are troglodytes. Any
| thing we know they can quintuple discount.
The earth is old, yet relatively very young.
| Our civilization dates from yesterday Mars
! is our senior. In the corridors of time her
civilization extends back through aeons.
Mars is not merely our senior. but our su-
perior. The superiority of planets is In
direct proportion to their distance from the
| sun. That proposition, advanced by Kant
J and since indorsed by science. has for cor
| ollary another to the effect that the matter
Of which is formed the inhabitants of the
| different planets is, in it's nature, lighter
and more subtle and their type of incarna-
tion more intellectual the farther away
they are.
| Mars is farther from the sun than the
earth. It's superiority is therefore a matter
| of course, rather would be a matter of
course were 1t not that we have amusing g
| habit Of regarding the rotten apple on
which we crawl the pick of the basket,
| Of assuming that we are top of creation,
| and, in spite of the knowledge that within
our narrow sphere of observation there are
not less than three hundred million worlds
many of which are Illuminated by suns
/ more magnificent than ours and by moons
| more colorful and neighborly-in spite of
this, or perhaps precisely on that account.
the problem is gravely posed whether by
peradventure, miracle or chance any of
these worlds can conceivably be inhabited.
But what are they doing there? Revolv-
ing in space for fun? Not bit of 1T.
In our Fathers house are many man.
sions. These worlds are a few of them.
| They form a broad avenue that extends
| from the slums of space to the upper cir
| cles of the universe. 1t is in the slums
that local humanity resides The humor
of it is that we mistake this tenderloin for
| fairyland, unique at that-the only habit
able plaisance. That is what you might
call human stupidity in all its plenitude.
Though. no doubt, illusions equally inane
are shared by the imbecles in Venus
which is nearer to the sun than the earth
and by the brutes on Mercury, which is
nearer still.
But not by Mars. There. in accordance
with Kants proposition, the inhabitants
must be to as we are to bushmen. While
| as for the inhabitants of the other planets
of this system they. in accordance with the
same proposition, possess attributes OF in
| creasing acumen.
These premises accepted. the natural de-
| duction follows that IL we, in our inferi-
| ority. are able to ring up Mars. 1t will be
| found that. not merely Is Mars prepared
and able to reply but that. il Mars has
| not already established communication with
| u.s. IL is because the inhabitants have been
more profitably engaged with those OF Ju-
piter. BY the same token IL may be found.
| too. that while Mars has been exchanging
messages with it's neighbor. that neighbor
has been telephoning to Uranus. the latter
! TO Neptune. Neptune TO the post-mortem,
| In which case there Is the circuit complete.
and from these upper circles an answer 10
| the great query will come.
What more. now. would you like? There