So, given, on this hypothesis, the existence of some thousand million solar systems or families of worlds, within our ken, and knowing what we do about the exuberant impulse towards vital development wherever it is possible, we must conclude that those worlds contain life; and if so, it is against all reasonable probability that the only world of which we happen to know the details contains the creature highest in the entire scale. It would be just as reasonable to imagine, what we happen to know is false, that our particular sun is the largest, and our particular planet the brightest of all, as it is to conjecture that this world is the highest and best, or the only one in existence. The self-glorifying instinct of the human mind has resented this negative conclusion, and for long clung to the Ptolemaic idea that the earth was no mere planet among a crowd of others, but was the centre of the universe; and that the sun and all the stars were subsidiary to it. A Ptolemaic idea clings to some of us still—not now as regards the planet, but as regards man; and we, insignificant creatures, with senses only just open to the portentous meaning of the starry sky, presume—some of us—to deny the existence of higher powers and higher knowledge than our own. We are accustomed to be careful as to what we assert; we are liable to be unscrupulous as to what we deny. It is possible to find people who, knowing nothing or next to nothing of the Universe, are prepared to limit existence to that of which they have had experience, and to measure the cosmos in terms of their own understanding. Their confidence in themselves, their shut minds and self-satisfied hearts, are things to marvel at. The fact is that no glimmer of a conception of the real magnitude and complexity of existence can ever have illuminated their cosmic view. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ XI IMMANENCE _Q. 11.  What caused and what maintains existence?_ _A._ Of our own knowledge we are unable to realise the meaning of origination or of maintenance; all that we ourselves can accomplish in the physical world is to move things into desired positions, and leave them to act on each other. Nevertheless our effective movements are all inspired by thought, and so we conceive that there must be some Intelligence immanent in all the processes of nature, for they are not random or purposeless, but organised and beautiful. * * * * * CLAUSE XI ORIGIN