Gabriel spoke of them and of their life with absolute certainty. Spectral analysis showed the same composition in the stars as on the earth, consequently if life had arisen in our atom, most certainly it must exist in other celestial bodies, though probably in different forms; in many planets it had already ended, in many it was still to come; but surely all those millions of worlds had had, or would have, life.
Religions, wishing to explain the origin of the world, paled and trembled before the infinite. It was like the Cathedral tower, which covered with its bulk a great part of the heavens, hiding millions of worlds, but which was of insignificant size compared to the immensity it hid, less than an infinitesimal part of a molecule—nothing. It seemed very great because it was close to men, concealing immensity, but when men looked above it, getting a full grasp of the infinite, they laughed at its Lilliputian pride.
"Then," inquired timidly the old organ-blower, pointing to the
Cathedral, "what is it they teach us in there?"
"Nothing," replied Gabriel.
"And what are we—men?" asked the Perrero.
"Nothing."
"And the governments, the laws, and the customs of society?" inquired the bell-ringer.
"Nothing. Nothing."
Sagrario fixed her eyes, grown larger by her earnest contemplation of the heavens, on her uncle.
"And God," she asked in a soft voice; "where is God?"