Show are there other habitable worlds here again we have only conjecture to guide us with respect to the bodies constituting the solar system which from their comparative proximity to tho earth might be supposed to a solution to this problem careful observations have heretofore offered no indication whatever of the existence 0 life upon their surfaces but life in some form or another may notwithstanding exist ona those bodies we must bear in mind that the planets aarein all probability in arious stages of development it may be reasonably presumed that the planets jupiter saturn uranus and neptune in consequence of their enormous bulk have cooled down more slowly than the earth and the other smaller planets of the solar system and are therefore less advanced as abodes of animated existence than the latter are but even in the case of the earth it must bo admitted to have revolved millions of years around the sun merely as a fiery orb before life appeared on its surface and even after it had cooled down and become the abode of animated existence it produced during countless millions of years more hie only iu its invest forms the existence of man is but of yesterday this is an instructive lesson it teaches us that although man exists on the earths surface it does not follow that being of the same order of intelligence as man exist upon all the other planets or even upon any of them gome of the planets life mav not have come into existence upon others life may eis in a less advanced stage than upon the earth and the same remark is obviously applicable to tho numberless bodies of the starry firmament the state of the question then is this we cannot pronounce positively upon the existence of life anywhere beyond the planet upon which wo ael but reasoning from analogy we may suppose that certain if not all of the other bodies of the planetary system which in so many respects bear affinity to our own planet are in like manner tho abodes of life in some form or another and that similarly there are countless bodies in the stella regions which may also be the abodes or life this is a however upon which the noble science of astronomy so distinguished for the exactitude of conclusions does not venture to pronounce a positive opinion seeing that there exists no sure basis of facts available for in these it is left for each individual inquirer to form his own opinion independent of any support derived from scientific authority I 1 prof grant |