Adventures in the Far Future & Tales of Outer Space — page 232: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

that we are near our limit, have used up our share of this force with which our race was born, and must prepare to die. “Do you understand, Mr. Latham? Perhaps you see. Neither beings—no, | shall say men!—neither men nor their races are immortal! For to be immortal is to be—the Almighty.” “We have succeeded in measuring. We have determined the limit of our racial life-span quite precisely. But beyond that, the secret is not ours. “Tam a Teacher, Mr. Latham. | have done my best to explain. It is all | know of the reason that we of Mars have no escape; that we must die. You, unfortunately, have found us in our last hows.” Lya’s smile was a tired, pitiful thing, and yet there was a courage in it that a thousand shouting men could not emulate. | had to say something. Anything at all. “Lya, we won't let this thing—this whatever-it-is—we won't let it win! If, somehow, this Life-force of which you Speak— if in some way we might trap it, analyse, isolate it, transfer some of what we have—” “No, Mr. Latham,” Lya said softly. “Through some physical miracle to be kept walking, talking —yes, even thinking, perhaps—no, for we would not be ourselves ... aS robots, as ... living-dead. A retrogression of a sort we could not endure, even for a kind of life! “You must forgive us for that. Our pride. We are a very proud race in our way, Mr. Latham. We have lived our life. What else there might be would be but a mockery of the Universal scheme of things—and our great life has never been one of mockery, or of pretense, Mr. Latham. For us, to pretend is not to live at all.” And gently, she placed a finger on my lips. “Thank you, Wes,” she said. “From our hearts, thank Lf you. CORniclooo SS CO