[The Iron Heel by Jack London]@TWC D-Link bookThe Iron Heel CHAPTER I 3/43
I think, and think, and I cannot cease from thinking.
I have been in the thick of life so long that I am oppressed by the peace and quiet, and I cannot forbear from dwelling upon that mad maelstrom of death and destruction so soon to burst forth. In my ears are the cries of the stricken; and I can see, as I have seen in the past,* all the marring and mangling of the sweet, beautiful flesh, and the souls torn with violence from proud bodies and hurled to God.
Thus do we poor humans attain our ends, striving through carnage and destruction to bring lasting peace and happiness upon the earth. * Without doubt she here refers to the Chicago Commune. And then I am lonely.
When I do not think of what is to come, I think of what has been and is no more--my Eagle, beating with tireless wings the void, soaring toward what was ever his sun, the flaming ideal of human freedom.
I cannot sit idly by and wait the great event that is his making, though he is not here to see.
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