“At times I almost dream I too have spent a life the sages’ way,

and tread once more familiar paths.  Perchance

I perished in an arrogant self-reliance

an age ago.  And in that act a prayer

for one more chance went up so earnest, so (…)

Instinct with better light let in by death

that life was blotted out not so completely

but scattered, wrecks enough of it to remain,

dim memories, as now, when seems

once more, the goal in sight again.”

—Robert Browning/“Paracelsus” (and later Fox Mulder/The X-Files)