7475. CONTINUATION ABOUT THE SPIRITS AND INHABITANTS OF THE PLANET MARS.
The spirits of the planet Mars appear to themselves as men such as they had been in the world, and therefore they have to others a like appearance; for everyone in the other life appears to others as he appears to himself, because the perception is communicated. When I wondered at this, they said that they cannot appear otherwise, because when they lived in the world they knew that they were spirits clothed with a body, and then thought little about their body, but only about the life of their spirit in the body; and therefore when they come into the other life they scarcely know that the state of life has been changed; and as they then also think about the life of their spirit just as they did in the world, they therefore appear to themselves like men. All spirits are indeed in the human form, but not in one so strikingly like that in which are the spirits of Mars; for with these the idea remains such as they had in the world. Moreover, with those who when in the world know and believe that in the other life they shall be in the human form, as the body decreases, this thought increases; and therefore when they put off the body which had served them for use in the world, from the idea impressed upon them they remain to themselves in a like form.