Epigraphs:
A power, a thirst, a knowledge, which below/ All thought, like light beyond the atmosphere,/ Clothing its clouds with grace, doth ever flow,/ Came on us, as we sate in silence there,/ Beneath the golden stars of the clear azure air. (Shelley)
In the deepest and most secret recesses of mind, there is nothing hidden from the individual self, or from others, which may not be...some time accidentally revealed; so that it might well be that, as De Quincey surmised, the opening of the book at the day of judgement shall be the unfolding of the everlasting scroll of memory. (from Body and Mind, Henry Maudsley)