Hunger and necessity are poor teachers of morality. A society that cannot provide the basics of life does not get its laws obeyed.

Machineries of reason, machineries of conduct, machineries of virtue. The machine that regulates instinct, keeps one’s hands free of another man’s throat, free of one’s own. These machines have all, as someone said, gone too long in the elements. Gummed now, rusted, bloodless.I forget who said it and I no longer care.

There are no human gods here, just hoods who think they are.