Surely mankind has yet to be born. Surely this is true! For only something blind and uncomprehending could exist in such a mean conjunction with its own flesh, its own kind. How else account for such faltering, clumsy, hateful cruelty? Even the possums and the skunks know better! Even the weasels and the meadow mice have a natural regard for their own blood and kin. Only the insects are low enough to do the low things that people do — like those ants that swarm on poplars in the summertime, greedily husbanding little green aphids for the honeydew they secrete. Yes, it could be that mankind has yet to be born. Ah, what bitter tears God must weep at the sight of the things that men do to other men! He broke off then and I saw him shake his head convulsively, his voice a sudden cry: In the name of money! Money!

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About William Styron

William Styron was a 20th-century American writer. William Clark Styron Jr. was an American novelist and essayist who won major literary awards for his work, including the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1968 for The Confessions of Nat Turner. Read more on Wikipedia →

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