Hammered

Cruelty, very far from being a vice,
Is the first sentiment Nature injects in us all.
The infant breaks his toy, bites his nurse’s breast,
Strangles his canary long before he is able
To reason; cruelty is stamped in animals,
In whom, as I think I have said, Nature's laws
Are more emphatically to be read than in ourselves;
Cruelty exists amongst savages,
So much nearer to Nature than civilized men are;
Absurd then to maintain cruelty is a consequence
Of depravity.... Cruelty is simply the energy
In a man civilization has not yet
Altogether corrupted: therefore it is a virtue, not a vice.

Donatien Alphonse-François de Sade