And yet--I go on killing." "It's in our blood," laughed Bruce, unmoved.

"Did you ever know a man, Jimmy, that didn't like to see things die?
Wouldn't every mother's soul of 'em go to a hanging if they had the chance?
Won't they crowd like buzzards round a dead horse to get a look at a man crushed to a pulp under a rock or a locomotive engine?
Why, Jimmie, if there weren't no law to be afraid of, we humans'd be killing one another for the fun of it! We would.

It's born in us to want to kill." "And we take it all out on brute creation," mused Langdon.

"After all, we can't have much sympathy for ourselves if a generation or two of us are killed in war, can we?
Mebby you're right, Bruce.

Inasmuch as we can't kill our neighbours legally whenever we have the inclination, it's possible the Chief Arbiter of things sends us a war now and then to relieve us temporarily of our blood-thirstiness.