it is not countries that go to war, but men

I am going to explain to you why we went to war. Why mankind always does to war. It is not social or political. It is not countries that go to war, but men. It is like salt. Once one has been to war, one has salt for the rest of one’s life. Men love war because it allows them to look serious. Because it is the one thing that stops women from laughing at them. Night fell again. There was war to the south, but our sector was quiet. The battle was over. Our casualties were some thirteen thousand killed–thirteen thousand minds, memories, loves, sensations, worlds, universes–because the human mind is more a universe than the universe itself–and all for a few hundred yards of useless mud. –John Fowles, “The Magus

back