Volume 4 (of 6) 47/137 They lived upon a town or province for six months, fifteen months, two years, until the town or province was exhausted. They alone were armed, master of the inhabitants, using and abusing things and persons according to their caprices. But they were declared bandits, calling themselves scorchers, (ecorcheurs) riders and adventurers, and not pretending to be humanitarian philosophers. Moreover, beyond an immediate and personal enjoyment, they demanded nothing; they employed brutal force only to satiate their greed, their cruelty, their lust .-- The latter add to private appetites a far greater devastation, the systematic and gratuitous ravages enforced upon them by the superficial theory with which they are imbued. |