“There's no doubt that he's heading straight for tragedy. It will be beautiful, of course, but should he throw his whole life away as a sacrificial offering to such a fleeting beauty--like a bird in flight glimpsed from a window?”

“Beauty is unbearable, drives us to despair, offering us for a minute the glimpse of an eternity that we should like to stretch out over the whole of time.”

“Saying this, he turned his head toward the window as if he were trying to solve the problems of human existence by concentrating on the beauty of the universe.”

“There had always been something to worry him ever since he could remember, always something that distracted him in the pursuit of beauty. For he did pursue beauty, and, therefore, Margaret's speeches did flutter away from him like birds.”

“He's throwing everything he can into the air on the chance that something might take flight. And we're the smallest, weakest bird.”

“When you look at a beautiful view from a window, the beautiful view also looks at you from the same window! But the window looks at both you and the view! Wise man is the window itself; he looks at everywhere!”