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" They’re not bad people. They just want a little more.”
“I thought feelings did not come into it?” The Arch Lector’s left eye had started to weep, and he pulled out a white handkerchief and gently dabbed it. “You grew up in the camps, Inquisitor Teufel.”
“You know I did, Your Eminence.”
“You have seen humanity in the raw.”
“About as raw as it gets, Your Eminence.”
“So tell me. These good people. If they get a little more, what will they want then?”
Vick paused a moment, but there was nothing else to say. “A little more.”
“Because that is the nature of people. And their little more must be taken from someone else, and that someone else will be less than delighted. One cannot eliminate unhappiness any more than one can eliminate darkness. The goal of government, you see,” and the Arch Lector prodded at the air with his bony forefinger, “is to load the unhappiness onto those least able to make you suffer for it. "
― Joe Abercrombie , A Little Hatred (The Age of Madness, #1)