"'in the life of every man, late or soon, there is a moment when he knows beyond whatever else he might understand, and whether he can articulate the knowledge or not, the terrifying fact that he is alone, and separate, and that he can be no other than the poor thing that is himself.'"

     Octavius Caesar to Nicolaus of Damascus, 10 August A.D. 14, as imagined by John Williams;Augustus, Book III ((New York:  New York Review of Books, 2015 [1971]), 293).