Our instrument makers have constructed telescopes more and more
powerful, and with these the whole number of stars visible is
carried up into the millions, say perhaps to fifty or one hundred
millions. For aught we know every one of those stars may have
planets like our own circling round it, and these planets may be
inhabited by beings equal to ourselves. To suppose that our globe
is the only one thus inhabited is something so unlikely that no
one could expect it. It would be very nice to know something about
the people who may inhabit these bodies, but we must await our
translation to another sphere before we can know anything on the
subject. Meanwhile, we have gained what is of more value than gold
or silver; we have learned that creation transcends all our
conceptions, and our ideas of its Author are enlarged accordingly.
XV
AN ASTRONOMICAL FRIENDSHIP
There are few men with whom I would like so well to have a quiet
talk as with Father Hell. I have known more important and more
interesting men, but none whose acquaintance has afforded me a
serener satisfaction, or imbued me with an ampler measure of a
feeling that I am candid enough to call self-complacency. The ties
that bind us are peculiar.
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