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DERANGEMENT

                                                         WAR_AND_PEACE

Quoting from Tolstoy's
"War and Peace" (1865-1869):



     Everything seemed so futile and insignificant
     in comparison with the stern and solemn train
     of thought that weakness from loss of blood,
     suffering, and the nearness of death, aroused
     in him.  Looking into Napoleon's eyes Prince
     Andrew thought of the insignificance of
     greatness, the unimportance of life which no
     one could understand, and the still greater
     unimportance of death, the meaning of which no
     one alive could understand or explain.

          Book III, Chapter XIX, p.385 (WC)





     His mind was not in a normal state.  A healthy man
     usually thinks of, feels, and remembers, innumerably
     things simultaneously, but has the power and the will
     to select one sequence of thoughts or events on which
     to fix his whole attention.  A healthy man can tear
     himself away from the deepest reflections to say a
     civil word to some one who comes in, and can then
     return again to his own thoughts.  But Prince
     Andrew's mind was not in a normal state in this
     respect.  All the powers of his mind were more active
     and clearer than ever, but they acted apart from his
     will.  Most diverse thoughts and images occupied him
     simultaneously.  At times his brain suddenly began to
     work with a vigour, clearness, and depth it had never
     reached when he was in health, but suddenly in the
     midst of its work it would turn to some unexpected
     idea and he had not the strength to turn it back
     again.

           Book XI, Chapter XXXII, p. 133-134 (WC)



((Pierre's faith in his earlier madness:  Book XV, Chapter XIX, p.414 (WC) ))
((Respect for an older version of yourself?))



((add some Poe quotes?))

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