---
title: "1 Approaching death Quotes By John C. Wright"
description: "1 Approaching death quotes by John C. Wright. Plus more from John C. Wright and more Approaching death sayings from other authors."
image: "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/9b3/john-c-wright-11300_approaching-death_you-were-burning-in-the-middle-of-the-wo_297457.jpg"
---

> [“You were burning in the middle of the worst solar storm our records can remember. (...) Everyone else fled. All your companions and crew left you alone to wrestle with the storm. “You did not blame them. In a moment…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/john-c-wright/you-were-burning-in-the-middle-of-the-worst-solar-storm-our-records/)

[John C. Wright](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/john-c-wright/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/9b3/john-c-wright-11300_approaching-death_you-were-burning-in-the-middle-of-the-wo_297457.jpg)

## More by John C. Wright

> [“The sensation of a baseball bat to the face was not any more pleasant when it came from an unexpected direction, without warning.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/john-c-wright/the-sensation-of-a-baseball-bat-to-the-face-was-not-any-more-pleasant/)

[John C. Wright](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/john-c-wright/)

> [“Truth destroys the worst in man; pleasure destroys the best. If you love truth more than happiness, then open; otherwise, let rest.” His”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/john-c-wright/truth-destroys-the-worst-in-man-pleasure-destroys-the-best-if-you/)

[John C. Wright](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/john-c-wright/)

> [Men's souls are crooked and unsound things, not good materials out of which to build friendships, families, households, cities, civilizations. But good or no,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/john-c-wright/men-s-souls-are-crooked-and-unsound-things-not-good-materials-out-of/)

[John C. Wright](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/john-c-wright/)

> [“You were burning in the middle of the worst solar storm our records can remember. (...) Everyone else fled. All your companions and crew…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/john-c-wright/you-were-burning-in-the-middle-of-the-worst-solar-storm-our-records/)

[John C. Wright](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/john-c-wright/)

> [“All medieval and classic cultures of the ancient world, including those on which Tolkien modeled his elves, routinely exposed their young and marriageable women…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/john-c-wright/all-medieval-and-classic-cultures-of-the-ancient-world-including/)

[John C. Wright](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/john-c-wright/)

> [“On THE AMBER SPYGLASS: "If this plotline was a motorist, it would have been arrested for driving while intoxicated, if it had not perished…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/john-c-wright/on-the-amber-spyglass-if-this-plotline-was-a-motorist-it-would-have/)

[John C. Wright](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/john-c-wright/)

> [“She said, “Look me right in the eye, and tell me you don’t love me, and I’ll go.” He stared at her. “Miss, I…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/john-c-wright/she-said-look-me-right-in-the-eye-and-tell-me-you-don-t-love-me-and-i/)

[John C. Wright](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/john-c-wright/)

> [“Of the seven Archons that had combined to form the Milky Way mind, Orion had been the Archon whose verve and remorseless drive inspired…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/john-c-wright/of-the-seven-archons-that-had-combined-to-form-the-milky-way-mind/)

[John C. Wright](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/john-c-wright/)

> [“Euryphaean, and the music of an instrument called a pianoforte, infinite resistance coil and the sanity glass, and all the inventions that sprang from”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/john-c-wright/euryphaean-and-the-music-of-an-instrument-called-a-pianoforte/)

[John C. Wright](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/john-c-wright/)

> [“Dr. Henry Templeton got the drop on me after I killed his grandfather before he was born. Apparently, that wasn’t enough to stop the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/john-c-wright/dr-henry-templeton-got-the-drop-on-me-after-i-killed-his-grandfather/)

[John C. Wright](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/john-c-wright/)

> [If Vulcans had a church, they’d be Catholics.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/john-c-wright/if-vulcans-had-a-church-they-d-be-catholics/)

[John C. Wright](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/john-c-wright/)

> [Greek myths are heroic, noble and tragic; but the American Dream is heroic, comical, and uplifting. Americans are a people in whom overweening ambition…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/john-c-wright/greek-myths-are-heroic-noble-and-tragic-but-the-american-dream-is/)

[John C. Wright](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/john-c-wright/)

> [ “\[After a period of separation, Phaeton and Daphne are cuddling.\] Diomedes, meanwhile, was leaning to look behind Helion, staring with open fascination at the… ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/john-c-wright/after-a-period-of-separation-phaeton-and-daphne-are-cuddling-diomedes/)

[John C. Wright](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/john-c-wright/)

> [The future did not arrive.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/john-c-wright/the-future-did-not-arrive/)

[John C. Wright](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/john-c-wright/)

> [“ ... a Second Generation of machine intelligences was attempted, designed with their instructions for how to think unalterably imprinted into their main process…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/john-c-wright/a-second-generation-of-machine-intelligences-was-attempted-designed/)

[John C. Wright](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/john-c-wright/)

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                        "text": "“You were burning in the middle of the worst solar storm our records can remember. (...) Everyone else fled. All your companions and crew left you alone to wrestle with the storm. “You did not blame them. In a moment of crystal insight, you realized that they were cowards beyond mere cowardice: their dependence on their immortality circuits had made it so that they could not even imagine risking their lives. They were all alike in this respect. They did not know they were not brave; they could not even think of dying as possible; how could they think of facing it, unflinching? “You did not flinch. You knew you were going to die; you knew it when the Sophotechs, who are immune to pain and fear, all screamed and failed and vanished. “And you knew, in that moment of approaching death, with all your life laid out like a single image for you to examine in a frozen moment of time, that no one was immortal, not ultimately, not really. The day may be far away, it may be further away than the dying of the sun, or the extinction of the stars, but the day will come when all our noumenal systems fail, our brilliant machines all pass away, and our records of ourselves and memories shall be lost. “If all life is finite, only the grace and virtue with which it is lived matters, not the length. So you decided to stay another moment, and erect magnetic shields, one by one; to discharge interruption masses into the current, to break up the reinforcement patterns in the storm. Not life but honor mattered to you, Helion: so you stayed a moment after that moment, and then another. (...) “You saw the plasma erupting through shield after shield (...) Chaos was attempting to destroy your life’s work, and major sections of the Solar Array were evaporated. Chaos was attempting to destroy your son’s lifework, and since he was aboard that ship, outside the range of any noumenal circuit, it would have destroyed your son as well. “The Array was safe, but you stayed another moment, to try to deflect the stream of particles and shield your son; circuit after circuit failed, and still you stayed, playing the emergency like a raging orchestra. “When the peak of the storm was passed, it was too late for you: you had stayed too long; the flames were coming. But the radio-static cleared long enough for you to have last words with your son, whom you discovered, to your surprise, you loved better than life itself. In your mind, he was the living image of the best thing in you, the ideal you always wanted to achieve. “ ‘Chaos has killed me, son,’ you said. ‘But the victory of unpredictability is hollow. Men imagine, in their pride, that they can predict life’s each event, and govern nature and govern each other with rules of unyielding iron. Not so. There will always be men like you, my son, who will do the things no one else predicts or can control. I tried to tame the sun and failed; no one knows what is at its fiery heart; but you will tame a thousand suns, and spread mankind so wide in space that no one single chance, no flux of chaos, no unexpected misfortune, will ever have power enough to harm us all. For men to be civilized, they must be unlike each other, so that when chaos comes to claim them, no two will use what strategy the other does, and thus, even in the middle of blind chaos, some men, by sheer blind chance, if nothing else, will conquer. “ ‘The way to conquer the chaos which underlies all the illusionary stable things in life, is to be so free, and tolerant, and so much in love with liberty, that chaos itself becomes our ally; we shall become what no one can foresee; and courage and inventiveness will be the names we call our fearless unpredictability…’ “And you vowed to support Phaethon’s effort, and you died in order that his dream might live.”",
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