e weight of the bigger
man exceeds that of the smaller nearly as seven exceeds four, or by
three-fourths. The taller man exceeds the smaller, then, much more in
weight than he does in strength; he is accordingly less active in
proportion to his size. Within certain limits, of course, size increases
a man's effective as well as his real strength. For instance, our tall
man in the preceding illustration cannot lift his own weight as readily
as the small man can lift his; but he can lift a weight of three hundred
pounds as easily as the small man can lift a weight of two hundred
pounds. When we get beyond certain limits of height, however, we get
absolute weakness as the result of the increase of weight. Swift's
Brobdingnags, for instance, would have been unable to stand upright; for
they were six times as tall as men, and therefore each Brobdingnag
would have weighed 216 times as much as a man, but would have possessed
only thirty-six times the muscular power. Their weight would have been
greater, then, in a sixfold greater degree than their strength, and, so
far as their mere weight was concerned, their condition would have
resembled that of an ordinary man under a load five times exceeding his
own weight. As no man could walk or stand upright under such a load, so
the Brobdingnags would have been powerless to move, despite, or rather
because of, their enormous stature. Applying the general considerations
here enunciated to the question of the probable size of creatures like
ourselves in other planets, we see that men in Jupiter should be much
smaller, men in Mercury much larger, than men on the earth. So also with
other animals.

But Swedenborg's spirit visitors from these planets taught differently.
'The horses of our earth,' he says, 'when seen by the spirits of
Jupiter, appeared to me smaller than usual, though rather robust; which
arose from the idea those spirits had respecting them. They informed me
that among them there are animals similar, though much larger; but that
they are wild, and in the woods, and that when they come in sight they
cause terror though they are harmless; they added that their terror of
them is natural or innate.'[28] On the other hand the inhabitants of
Mercury, who might be thirteen feet high yet as active as our men,
appeared slenderer than Terrene men. 'I was desirous to know,' says
Swedenborg, 'what kind of face and person the people in Mercury have,
compared with those of the people on