. Nevertheless they are supposed to have local habitations
and cities wherein they dwell, though these are as unsubstantial as their
inhabitants; they are even thought to eat and drink some thin ambrosial
sustenance, and generally to be capable of doing whatever mankind can do, only
after a visionary ghostly fashion as in a dream. On the other hand, as long as
they remain where they are they never die - the only form of death in the unborn
world being the leaving it for our own. They are believed to be extremely
numerous, far more so than mankind. They arrive from unknown planets, full
grown, in large batches at a time; but they can only leave the unborn world by
taking the steps necessary for their arrival here - which is, in fact, by
suicide.
    They ought to be an exceedingly happy people, for they have no extremes of
good or ill fortune; never marrying, but living in a state much like that fabled
by the poets as the primitive condition of mankind. In spite of this, however,
they are incessantly complaining; they know that we in this world have bodies,
and indeed they know everything else about us, for they move among us
whithersoever they will, and can read our thoughts, as well as survey our
actions at pleasure. One would think that this should be enough for them; and
most of them are indeed alive to the desperate risk which they will run by
indulging themselves in that body with sensible warm motion which they so much
desire; nevertheless, there are some to whom the ennui of a disembodied
existence is so intolerable that they will venture anything for a change; so
they resolve to quit The conditions which they must accept are so uncertain,
that none but the most foolish of the unborn will consent to them; and it is
from these, and these only, that our own ranks are recruited.
    When they have finally made up their minds to leave, they must go before the
magistrate of the nearest town, and sign an affidavit of their desire to quit
their then existence. On their having done this, the magistrate reads them the
conditions which they must accept, and which are so long that I can only extract
some of the principal points, which are mainly the following: -
    First, they must take a potion which will destroy their memory and a sense
of identity; they must go into the world helpless, and without a will of their
own; they must draw lots for their dispositions before they go, and take them,
such as they are, for better or worse - neither are they to be
