What “We are such stuff As dreams are made on, and our little life…” means
We are such stuff
As dreams are made on, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.
— Prospero, The Tempest · William Shakespeare
We're made of the same stuff as dreams, and our brief life is wrapped in sleep at both ends.
Prospero reflects that everything — the pageant, the world, human life — is as insubstantial as a dream, and ends in the sleep of death. It is Shakespeare's gentlest meditation on mortality: not bitter, but calmly aware of how fleeting it all is.