The Last Man

Men love a prop so well, that they will lean on a pointed poisoned spear; and such was he, the impostor, who, with fear of hell for his scourge, most ravenous wolf, played the driver to a credulous flock.

I spread the whole earth out as a map before me. On no one spot of its surface could I put my finger and say, here is safety.

her eyes were not dark, but impenetrably deep; you seemed to discover space after space in their intellectual glance

I now began to be human. I was admitted within that sacred boundary which divides the intellectual and moral nature of man from that which characterizes animals.

Once my heart sat lightly in my bosom; all the beauty of the world was doubly beautiful, irradiated by the sun–light shed from my own soul.

his love for Evadne became deep–rooted, as he each day became more certain that the path he pursued was full of difficulty, and that he must seek his reward, not in the applause or gratitude of his fellow creatures, hardly in the success of his plans, but in the approbation of his own heart, and in her love and sympathy, which was to lighten every toil and recompence every sacrifice.

Goethe has said, that in youth we cannot be happy unless we love. I did not love; but I was devoured by a restless wish to be something to others.

His soul seemed to distil itself into the words he wrote; and they breathed on the paper, bearing with them a portion of the life of love, which was his life.

I now began to be human. I was admitted within that sacred boundary which divides the intellectual and moral nature of man from that which characterizes animals.