i;8 MAN'S PLACE IN THE UNIVERSE 



stars than of her acorns? If indeed she has no grander 

 aim than to provide a home for her greatest experiment, 

 Man, it would be just like her methods to scatter a mil- 

 lion stars whereof one might haply achieve her purpose. 



The number of possible abodes of life severely 

 restricted in this way at the outset may no doubt be 

 winnowed down further. On our house-hunting expedi- 

 tion we shall find it necessary to reject many apparently 

 eligible mansions on points of detail. Trivial circum- 

 stances may decide whether organic forms originate at 

 all; further conditions may decide whether life ascends 

 to a complexity like ours or remains in a lower form. 

 I presume, however, that at the end of the weeding 

 out there will be left a few rival earths dotted here and 

 there about the universe. 



A further point arises if we have especially in mind 

 contemporaneous life. The time during which man has 

 been on the earth is extremely small compared with the 

 age of the earth or of the sun. There is no obvious 

 physical reason why, having once arrived, man should 

 not continue to populate the earth for another ten billion 

 years or so; but — well, can you contemplate it? Assum- 

 ing that the stage of highly developed life is a very 

 small fraction of the inorganic history of the star, the 

 rival earths are in general places where conscious life 

 has already vanished or is yet to come. I do not think 

 that the whole purpose of the Creation has been staked 

 on the one planet where we live; and in the long run we 

 cannot deem ourselves the only race that has been or 

 will be gifted with the mystery of consciousness. But 

 I feel inclined to claim that at the present time our race 

 is supreme; and not one of the profusion of stars in 

 their myriad clusters looks down on scenes comparable 

 to those which are passing beneath the rays of the sun. 



