A Fair Spirit

Great are the stars, and man is of no account to them. But man is a fair spirit, whom a star conceived and a star kills. He is greater than those bright blind companies. For though in them there is incalculable potentiality, in him there is achievement, small, but actual. Too soon, seemingly, he comes to his end. But when he is done he will not be nothing, not as though he had never been; for he is eternally a beauty in the eternal form of things.

Last and First Men (1930) by Olaf Stapledon

Get the book at Bookshop.org Supports independent bookstores. We earn a small commission.

Context: Words of the youngest of the Last Men, with which the book's narrator closes the story as humanity faces extinction.

Rate this quoteNot rated yet
Not in a duel yet

Source: Chapter XVI, The Last of Man, section 3: Epilogue

More from Last and First Men