Can't Quite Lay My Finger On It

I have a funny feeling. A few years ago, I had read a book, a twelve volume book. And in the middle of one of those volumes, I had stumbled upon a phrase, a metaphor, which lingered at the back of my mind for months. Now, something happened which brought back that idea, ingrained in a long paragraph in a book long since forgotten. And I want to reread that, desperately. I want to read over that paragraph, savor the feel of the tongue rolling over each word and chew out the crux of that message. The book is A Dance To The Music of Time. And the quote is about the commonest topic of them all, vicissitudes of life.