

ORGANIC EVOLUTION 25 
Astronomy in the University of Oxford, lecturing at 
the Royal Institution last December, is reported to 
have said, “All the stars that we saw [that is, all 
visible stars], with a few insignificant exceptions, had 
a temperature somewhat like that of the sun, and 
therefore they too must be destitute of life. But 
there might be comparatively cool bodies circling 
round the stars in the same way as the planets round 
the sun, and to these the objection of high tempera- 
ture might notapply. To the question are the planets 
inhabited, his answer would be that, in the absence 
of evidence he did not know, but that he felt pretty 
sure they were, because they were so like the earth 
in many particulars, that they might be supposed to 
be like it in this one.” 
