" As Peggy snored beside him, Tom pondered the Greek and Hebrew legends of the scapegoat. Pharmakos to the Greeks, Azazel to the Hebrews. A shameful human practice, he’d always thought, one born from guilt and superstition. But most human behavior had grown out of necessity, and he now understood the empirical value of the rituals for which he had felt only contempt before. "

― Greg Iles , Natchez Burning (Penn Cage, #4)