My good hoe as it bites the ground revenges my wrongs, and I have less lust to bite my enemies. In the smoothing the rough hillocks, I smooth my temper.
That space the Evil One abstracted stood From his own evil, and for the time remained Stupidly good, of enmity disarmed, Of guile, of hate, of envy, of revenge .
Mind is a duality; it is always split. There is no single point on which the mind agrees in totality. Half of the mind will agree and half of the mind will disagree, and whatever you choose, you are choosing only the half. The remaining half is going to take revenge. The unchosen part, the left over, will wait for its chance to show you that whatever you have chosen is wrong. But it does not matter which part you choose. Choice itself is wrong.
The death penalty fulfills a preventive function, but it is also very clearly a form of revenge. It is an especially severe form of punishment because it is so final. The human life is ended and the executed person is deprived of the opportunity to change, to restore the harm done or compensate for it.
There is no passion in the mind of man so weak, but it mates and masters the fear of death . . . Revenge triumphs over death; love slights it; honor aspireth to it; grief flieth to it.
A wrong is unredressed when retribution overtakes its redresser. It is equally unredressed when the avenger fails to make himself felt as such to him who has done the wrong.
Crude men who feel themselves insulted tend to assess the degree of insult as high as possible, and talk about the offense in greatly exaggerated language, only so they can revel to their heart's content in the aroused feelings of hatred and revenge.