“He sought his former accustomed fear of death and did not find it. "Where is it? What death?" There was no fear because there was no death.In place of death there was light.”

“Man cannot possess anything as long as he fears death. But to him who does not fear it, everything belongs. If there was no suffering, man would not know his limits, would not know himself. ”

“One step beyond that boundary line which resembles the line dividing the living from the dead lies uncertainty, suffering, and death. And what is there? Who is there?--there beyond that field, that tree, that roof lit up by the sun? No one knows, but one wants to know. You fear and yet long to cross that line, and know that sooner or later it must be crossed and you will have to find out what is there, just as you will inevitably have to learn what lies the other side of death. But you are strong, healthy, cheerful, and excited, and are surrounded by other such excitedly animated and healthy men.”

“Everything ends in death, everything. Death is terrible.”

“Death is finished, he said to himself. It is no more!”

“Sometimes she did not know what she feared, what she desired: whether she feared or desired what had been or what would be, and precisely what she desired, she did not know.”

“What is the matter with you?" asked Shcherbatsky."Nothing much, but there is little to be happy about in this world.""Little? You'd better come with me to Paris instead of going to some Mulhausen or other. You'll see how jolly it will be!""No, I have done with that; it is time for me to die.""That is a fine thing!" said Shcherbatsky, laughing. "I am only just beginning to live.""Yes, I thought so too till lately; but now I know that I shall soon die."Levin was saying what of late he had really been thinking. He saw death and the apprroach of death in everything; but the work he had begun interested him all the more. After all, he had to live his life somehow, til death came. Everything for him was wrapped in darkness; but just because of the darkness, feeling his work to be the only thread to guide him through the darkness, he seized upon it and clung to it with all his might.”