“Ennui is the echo in us of time tearing itself apart.”

“Between Ennui and Ecstasy unwinds our whole experience of time.”

“True confessions are written with tears only. But my tears would drown the world, as my inner fire would reduce it to ashes.”

“Tears do not burn except in solitude.”

“Bach: a scale of tears upon which our desires for God ascend.”

“Even in childhood I watched the hours flow, independent of any reference, any action, any event, the disjunction of time from what was not itself, its autonomous existence, its special status, its empire, its tyranny. I remember quite clearly that afternoon when, for the first time, confronting the empty universe, I was no more than a passage of moments reluctant to go on playing their proper parts. Time was coming unstuck from being—at my expense.”

“What misery a sensation is! Ecstasy itself, perhaps, is nothing more.”