“If time ends, and death and oblivion are the only future for the universe and its inhabitants, what’s the point of being part of it? The answer must surely be that there are things which transcend time and which have an intrinsic value out of all proportion to their duration. These include sentient thoughts, feelings, and relationships. We would say that to have loved and to have been loved — and to know it unquestionably at the deepest possible level — possesses that kind of transcendence. Lovers know instinctively that what they feel for each other is infinitely precious and independent of duration. In an ideal universe, it lasts forever. In the hazardous universe we live in, the fragility of human life can tragically interrupt it. Yet lovers who enjoy relationships in which the life of their beloved is far more important to them than their own have touched something so exquisitely powerful that its effect is permanent. Its mark on them is indelible. By experiencing that intensity of love, they have — in a very real sense — escaped from the limitations of time into eternity.”