How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
[Stormgren] had severed mankind for forty years, and its masters for five, and few men could look back upon a life that had seen so many of its ambitions achieved. Perhaps that was the trouble: in the years of retirement, however many they might be, he would have no further goals to give any zest to life. (3.1)
There are only two things certain about life in Childhood's End—the first is death, and the second is that life needs a purpose to add "zest" to it. Oh, and perhaps taxes. They're never mentioned in the book, but we're pretty certain they are still a part of life. So three things are certain, we guess.
Quote #2
"We have had our failures."
Yes, Karellen that was true: and were you the one who failed, before the dawn of human history? It must have been a failure indeed, thought Stormgren, for its echoes to roll down all the ages, to haunt the childhood of every race of man. (4.161-162)
Childhood's End is what you might call a big picture kind of novel. It's looking at the life and existence of the entire human race while occasionally peeping in on the personal lives and existences of individual people. As this quote shows, that big picture extends into the past, present, and future.
Quote #3
Production had become largely automatic: the robot factories poured forth consumer goods in such unending streams that all the ordinary necessities of life were virtually free. Men worked for the sake of the luxuries they desired: or they did not work at all. (6.18)
Thing about life in the future: It's way better than life in the past, by which we mean the now. Aircars? Yes, please. Of course, the good comes with the bad….