“For all the compasses in the world, there's only one direction, and time is its only measure.”

“We must be born with an intuition of mortality. Before we know the word for it. Before we know that there are words. Out we come, bloodied and squalling, with the knowledge that for all the points of the compass, there's only one direction. And time is its only measure.”

“Whatever became of the momentwhen one first knew about death? There must have been one, a moment, in childhood, when it first occurred to you that you don't go on forever. It must have been shattering, stamped into one's memory. And yet I can't remember it. It never occurred to me at all. We must be born with an intuition of mortality. Before we know the word for it, before we know that there are words,out we come, bloodied and squalling...with the knowledge that for all the points of the compass, there's only one directionand time is its only measure.”

“North was only a direction indicated by a compass--if a man had one, that is, for otherwise there was no north or south or east or west; there was only the brooding desolation.”

“There's only one direction you can coast.”

“Was there only one world after all which spent its time dreaming of others?”