To understand how the Martians tricked themselves, and how they were
finally undone by their own insane will, we must glance at their
history.
The civilized Martians constituted the sole remaining variety of a
species. That species itself, in the remote past, had competed with, and
exterminated, many other species of the same general type. Aided by the
changing climate, it had also exterminated almost all the species of the
more terrestrial kind of fauna, and had thereby much reduced the
vegetation which it was subsequently to need and foster so carefully.
This victory of the species had been due partly to its versatility and
intelligence, partly to a remarkable zest in ferocity, partly to its
unique powers of radiation and sensitivity to radiation, which enabled
it to act with a coordination impossible even to the most gregarious of
animals. But, as with other species in biological history, the capacity
by which it triumphed became at length a source of weakness. When the
species reached a stage corresponding to primitive human culture, one of
its races, achieving a still higher degree of radiant intercourse and
physical unity, was able to behave as a single vital unit; and so it
succeeded in exterminating all its rivals. Racial conflict had persisted
for many thousands of years, but as soon as the favoured race had
developed this almost absolute solidarity of will, its victory was
sweeping, and was clinched by joyous massacre of the enemy.
But ever afterwards the Martians suffered from the psychological effects
of their victory at the close of the epoch of racial wars. The extreme
brutality with which the other races had been exterminated conflicted
with the generous impulses which civilization had begun to foster, and
left a scar upon the conscience of the victors. In self-defence they
persuaded themselves that since they were so much more admirable than
the rest, the extermination was actually a sacred duty. And their unique
value, they said, consisted in their unique radiational development.
Hence arose a gravely insincere tradition and culture, which finally
ruined the species. They had long believed that the physical basis of
consciousness must necessarily be a system of units directly sensitive
to ethereal vibrations, and that organisms dependent on the physical
contact of their parts were too gross to have any experience whatever.
After the age of the racial massacres they sought to persuade themselves
that the excellence, or ethical worth, of any organism depended upon the
degree of complexity and unity of its radiation. Century by century they
strengthened their faith in this vulgar doctrine, and developed also a
system of quite irrational delusions and obsessions based upon an
obsessive and passionate lust in radiation.
It would take too long to tell of all these subsidiary fantasies, and of
the ingenious ways in which they were reconciled with the main body of
sane knowledge. But one at least must be mentioned, because of the part
it played in the struggle with man. The Martians knew, of course, that
‘solid matter’ was solid by virtue of the interlocking of the minute
electro-magnetic systems called atoms. Now rigidity had for them
somewhat the same significance and prestige that air, breath, spirit,
had for early man. It was in the quasi-solid form that Martians were
physically most potent; and the maintenance of this form was exhausting
and difficult. These facts combined in the Martian consciousness with
the knowledge that rigidity was after all the outcome of interlocked
electro-magnetic systems. Rigidity was thus endowed with a peculiar
sanctity. The superstition was gradually consolidated, by a series of
psychological accidents, into a fanatical admiration of all very rigid
materials, but especially of hard crystals, and above all of diamonds.
For diamonds were extravagantly resistant; and at the same time, as the
Martians themselves put it, diamonds were superb jugglers with the
ethereal radiation called light. Every diamond was therefore a supreme
embodiment of the tense energy and eternal equilibrium of the cosmos,
and must be treated with reverence. In Mars, all known diamonds were
exposed to sunlight on the pinnacles of sacred buildings; and the
thought that on the neighbour planet might be diamonds which were not
properly treated, was one motive of the invasion.
Thus did the Martian mind, unwittingly side-tracked from its true
development, fall sick, and strive ever more fanatically towards mere
phantoms of its goal. In the early stages of the disorder, radiation was
merely regarded as an infallible _sign_ of mentality, and radiative
complexity was taken as an infallible _measure_, merely, of spiritual
worth. But little by little, radiation and mentality failed to be
distinguished, and radiative organization was actually mistaken for
spiritual worth.
In this obsession the Martians resembled somewhat the First Men during
their degenerate phase of servitude to the idea of movement; but with a
difference. For the Martian intelligence was still active, though its
products were severely censored in the name of the ‘spirit of the race’.
Every Martian was a case of dual personality. Not merely was he
sometimes a private consciousness, sometimes the consciousness of the
race, but further, even as a private individual he was in a manner
divided against himself. Though his practical allegiance to the
super-individual was absolute, so that he condemned or ignored all
thoughts and impulses that could not be assimilated to the public
consciousness, he did in fact have such thoughts and impulses, as it
were in the deepest recesses of his being. He very seldom noticed that
he was having them, and whenever he did notice it, he was shocked and
terrified; yet he did have them. They constituted an intermittent,
sometimes almost a continuous, critical commentary on all his more
reputable experience.
This was the great tragedy of the spirit on Mars. The Martians were in
many ways extremely well equipped for mental progress and for true
spiritual adventure, but through a trick of fortune which had persuaded
them to prize above all else unity and uniformity, they were driven to
thwart their own struggling spirits at every turn.
Far from being superior to the private mind, the public mind which
obsessed every Martian was in many ways actually inferior. It had come
into dominance in a crisis which demanded severe military coordination;
and though, since that remote age, it had made great intellectual
progress, it remained at heart a military mind. Its disposition was
something between that of a field-marshal and the God of the ancient
Hebrews. A certain English philosopher once described and praised the
fictitious corporate personality of the state, and named it ‘Leviathan’.
The Martian super-individual was Leviathan endowed with consciousness.
In this consciousness there was nothing but what was easily assimilated
and in accord with tradition. Thus the public mind was always
intellectually and culturally behind the times. Only in respect of
practical social organization did it keep abreast of its own
individuals. Intellectual progress had always been initiated by private
individuals, and had only penetrated the public mind when the mass of
individuals had been privately infected by intercourse with the
pioneers. The public consciousness itself initiated progress only in the
sphere of social, military, and economic organization.
The novel circumstances which were encountered on the earth put the
mentality of the Martians to a supreme test. For the unique enterprise
of tackling a new world demanded the extremes of both public and private
activity, and so led to agonizing conflicts within each private mind.
For, while the undertaking was essentially social and even military, and
necessitated very strict coordination and unity of action, the extreme
novelty of the new environment demanded all the resources of the
untrammelled private consciousness. Moreover the Martians encountered
much on the earth which made nonsense of their fundamental assumptions.
And in their brightest moment of private consciousness they sometimes
recognized this fact.