It was easy to believe in them when you were with a mere handful of companions on some strange, hostile world where the very rocks and air (if there was air) were completely alien. Then nothing could be taken for granted, and the experience of a thousand Earth-bound generations might be useless. As ancient man had peopled the unknown around him with gods and spirits, so Homo astronauticus looked over his shoulder when he landed upon each new world, wondering who or what was here already. For a few brief centuries Man had imagined himself the lord of the universe, and those primeval hopes and
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