“You may either win your peace, or buy it:—win it,
by resistance to evil;—buy it, by compromise with evil. You may buy your peace,
with silenced consciences; you may buy it, with broken vows, buy it, with lying
words, buy it, with base connivances.—buy it, with the blood of the slain, and
the cry of the captive, and the silence of lost souls—over hemispheres of the
earth, while you sit smiling at your serene hearths, lisping comfortable
prayers evening and morning, and counting your pretty Protestant beads (which
are flat, and of gold, instead of round, and of ebony, as the monks' ones
were), and so mutter continually to yourselves, ‘Peace, peace,’ when there is
No peace; but only captivity and death, for you, as well as for those you leave
unsaved;—and yours darker than theirs.” —English art critic and social
commentator John Ruskin (1819-1900), “The Work of Iron, in Nature, Art, and Policy,” Lecture at Tunbridge Wells,
February 16, 1858
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