But this was the eighteenth century, when life was cheap and ambition unlimited. — Ben Aaronovitch

The trouble with turning a blind eye is that people often take the opportunity to punch you in the face.

“Desperate people do desperate things,” said Spencer-Talbot. “Perhaps if we all did more to make things less desperate, then perhaps there would be less violence.”

“This is a terrible work,” I said. “Why did you do it?”

“The usual reasons,” said the Magister. “I told myself it was piety and duty to the Church, but a thousand years of contemplation will batter down the doors of one’s own delusions.”