# Humanity on Venus explained — Last and First Men

> Chapter companion for Last and First Men by Olaf Stapledon.

## What happens

The chapter describes humanity's migration to Venus and the long, difficult process of adapting to the new planet. The initial settlers face harsh conditions, including extreme weather, atmospheric explosions, and plagues, leading to a decline in intelligence and culture. Over millions of years, humanity evolves into new species, including the seal-like submen and the aerial Seventh Men, who develop a unique, flight-based civilization. The chapter ends with the Seventh Men's culture enduring for a hundred million years, though it is ultimately undermined by biological instability and the loss of ancient knowledge.

## Themes in this chapter

### Humanity and the Other

The relationship with the Venerians, whose extermination haunts the settlers, and the adaptation to an alien world.

### Suffering and Redemption

The immense suffering of the settlers—plagues, storms, and decline—and the eventual emergence of new forms of life.

### The Limits of Knowledge

The failure to master the Venerian water and the nervous system cancer, leading to a rejection of science and the burning of books.

### Immortality and Death

The Seventh Men's philosophy that death is essential to beauty, and their acceptance of racial suicide as preferable to a pedestrian existence.

## Character check-ins

### The Fifth Men

The original settlers on Venus, whose world-order is destroyed by plagues and decline, leading to the emergence of new species.

### The Sixteenth Men

Mentioned as the species that harpooned the seal-men out of existence, though not a focus of the chapter.

### The Seventh Men

The aerial species that develops a flight-based civilization on Venus, lasting for a hundred million years.

### The Venerians

The exterminated native species of Venus, whose memory contributes to humanity's sense of guilt.

### Fate

Personified as the force that plucks humanity up and casts it upon another world.

### The Terrestrials

Humanity as a whole, adapting and evolving on Venus.

## Key lines

> The sapling, humanity, transplanted into foreign soil, withers at first almost to the root, slowly readjusts itself, grows into strength and a certain permanence of form, burgeons, season by season, with leaf and flower of many successive civilizations and cultures, sleeps winter by winter, through many ages of reduced vitality, but at length (to force the metaphor), avoids this recurrent defeat by attaining an evergreen constitution and a continuous efflorescence.

Humanity on Venus initially struggles and nearly dies out, but gradually adapts, developing many civilizations and cultures over time, eventually achieving a stable and flourishing state.

_This metaphor describes the overall arc of human history on Venus._

> The lovely flame, of which we all are members, must die, he said, must die; for without death she would fall short of beauty.

A dying sage of the Seventh Men teaches that death is essential for beauty, and that both individuals and the race must eventually perish to achieve perfection.

_This reflects the Seventh Men's philosophy of embracing ephemeral beauty and rejecting immortality._

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/last_and_first_men_se/chapters/xiii-humanity-on-venus
- Book: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/last_and_first_men_se
- All chapters: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/last_and_first_men_se/chapters