Once upon a time there was a king, and the king commissioned his favorite wizard to create a magic mirror. This mirror didn__ show you your reflection. It showed you your soul__t showed you who you really were.The wizard couldn__ look at it without turning away. The king couldn__ look at it. The courtiers couldn__ look at it. A chestful of treasure was offered to anyone who could look at it for sixty seconds without turning away. And no one could.

And the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each purple curtain Thrilled me- filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before; So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating, "'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door- Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door;- This it is, and nothing more.

Love is an exorcism of angels.

If on thoughts of death we are fed,Thus, a coffin, became my bed.

To feel our character, our personality, and our personal, hard-won history fade from being is to be exposed to whatever lies beneath these comforting, operational conveniences. What remains when the conscious and functioning self has been erased is mankind's fundamental condition _ irrational, violent, guilt-wracked, despairing, and mad.

Whether consciousness is implanted in us by something divine, or whether it is created by the efforts of our brains, the end result is the same. We are.