Bathroom Monologue: Sitting over an imaginary court, OR, “You are as wise as you are gentle, my lord.” –A eunuch in George Martin’s Clash of Kings

"We are all only as wise as we are gentle. There is no intelligent violence. There is not a genius who cripples, no murderous brilliance. The strategy of war, planning to disable and maim, is only a compensation for failures of integrity. Wisdom comes in cooperation and compassion. The best indication of practical wisdom is how willing people are to do what you wish them to do; if they are willing without fear, then you are wise, and if they are willing without malice towards others, you are among the wisest. To be brash is to have not thought on something enough. To be harsh may be thought to set an example, but it is only thought so by the unwise – and that is why the death penalty has not outlived crime. All violence is some expression of ignorance or desperation. Sometimes these things extend into the supposedly higher faults, like greed. But greed is just ignorance of where resources will come from when you’ve used them all up, or harmed all the suppliers, or something of which I am ignorant."