Oh, if the moon only had a secret, if the moon only held a truth. But the moon was just the moon.

A perfectly evil Devil makes even less sense than a perfect God.

I was obsessed with religious questions, the basics: Why are we here? Why is the world so beautiful?

Nothing in all the world is so nonsensical and contradictory, save mortals, that is, who live in the grip of the superstitions of the past.

And then there came the pounding of another drum, as if another giant were coming yards behind him, and each giant, intent on his own drum, gave no notice to the rhythm of the other. The sound grew louder and louder until it seemed to fill not just my hearing but all my senses, to be throbbing in my lips and fingers, in the flesh of my temples, in my veins.

We live in a world full of accidents finally in which on aesthetic principles have a consistency of which we can be sure. Right and wrong we will struggle with forever striving to create and maintain an ethical balance. Right and wrong we will struggle with forever, striving to create and maintain an ethical balance; but the shimmer of summer rain under the street lamps or the great flashing glare of artillery against a night sky – such brutal beauty is beyond dispute.

What if I could give you your life back; pluck out the pain; and give you a world of unimaginable beauty that would be for all time.