"Laurence Manning - The Living Galaxy" - читать интересную книгу автора (Manning Laurence)

THE LIVING GALAXY
Laurence Manning

How long the human race will exist on the surface of the planet is the subject of frequent
discussion by geologists, physicists, psychologists, philosophersтАФand military men. Perhaps, some
of them think, the time may come when our descendants will spread out among the stars of the
universe, and this planet itself will be but a cold pinhead endlessly rolling around an equally cold
orange which will be all that is left of the sun. Laurence Manning takes us, in this charming and
highly imaginative tale, out beyond the years and the light-years, to give us a glimpse of
possibilities so far beyond tomorrow that the human mind can hardly conceive of the distance and
the day. The very memory of the home planet has completely disappeared, but the human ideal
continues, untarnished and unweakened by time. That is the message of the story, if message it
must have: mankind is more than it knows or dreams.

FOREWORD
It is impossible for me, as author, to write this story so that it is complete in itself; I must ask you, as
reader, to lend a hand to the work. This is what must be done: Close your eyes and picture to yourself a
classroom of children about six years of age. You are one of these children. You have a book open in
front of you and, as you read it, a lecturer says the words of it out loud, so that the subject matter is
impressed through ear as well as eye. The date is very far in the futureтАФmore than 500,000,000 years,
and the sun, Earth, Mars, Venus, and other ancient things have long since died and become as forgotten
and legendary as the Garden of Eden. You, at the age of six, have played with strange toysтАФtoys that
would puzzle a skilled engineer today. You look forward to a whole century of study, research, sport,
amusement, and philosophy. This first century is your childhood and it will end when you go to the great
hospital to be operated upon and made bodily young once more. After that you are grown up and set
about doing your work in the worldтАФin whatever world you please, as a matter of fact, for there are
billions of planets to choose from. You expect to live in this way forever, except for the risk of accidents.
There is no hurry about learning or doing anythingтАФbut at six you are curious and ill-informed and this is
the very first time you have been given any insight into the history of the human race, its habitations and its
physical limits.
So you look around the room, with its bare green tinted walls, and gaze at the young face of the
lecturer with awe, for his eyes are the most astonishingly intelligent things you have ever seen and they
stare out from the youthful head with all the contrast and force of a scream coming out of the dark night.
His name is History Zeta Nine and you have been told by one of your playmates that he is more than
100,000,000 years old. You did not believe it until he entered the room. Now you rather wonder if he
can be as young as that! All through the reading, your eyes wander from the page every few minutes to
steal a glance at this ancient manтАФjust a glance, for you dread lest those burning eyes might meet yours.
Now, if you are ready, we will commence the history lesson:
As human beings, history must start for us upon a planet circling a small sun that has long since died.
This sun was not located in our present universe, but very far away from here in a large cluster of stars
known by courtesy as the "First Universe." In the Chart of Space it is known as Nebula X23G79 and is
medium sized, slightly smaller than the one in which our sun and planets happen to be located. It will be
the object of this first introduction to history to paint a brief picture of the progress of the race through
space and to give some hints as to its final limits and their possible nature. When you have understood
this general picture, we shall be in a position to go into more detail, but this is reserved for future lessons.
The planet on which the race first developed was called "Earth" and it possessed by nature a climate
and an atmosphere suitable to human existence without any artificial aids. In all of Space, counting
millions upon millions of Universes, such a condition has been noted only seventy-two times, so that it
may be considered extraordinary. Eight other planets circled the same sun and two of these called "Mars"
and "Venus" (all ancient heavenly bodies were named instead of numbered) were colonized with great