THE COSMIC COMPUTER

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Lucas, who was now regarding him with narrow-eyed suspicion.

"You mean you categorically state that that computer actually exists?"

"That, I think, was the general idea. Yes. I certainly do believe that
Merlin exists."

Maybe he was telling the truth. Merlin existed in the beliefs and hopes
of people like Dolf Kellton and Klem Zareff and Judge Ledue and Kurt
Fawzi. Merlin was a god to them. Well, take Ghu, the Thoran
Grandfather-God. Ghu was as preposterous, theologically, as Merlin was
technologically; Ghu, except to Thorans, was a Federation-wide joke. But
he'd known a couple of Thorans at the University, funny little fellows,
with faces like terriers, their bodies covered with matted black hair.
They believed in Ghu the way he believed in the Second Law of
Thermodynamics. Ghu was with them every moment of their lives. Take away
their belief in Ghu, and they would have been lost and wretched.