People can justify almost anything. That's why history keeps repeating itself.

from something I read

In the end is it not futile to try and follow the course of a quarrel between husband and wife? Such a conversation is sure to meander more than any other. It draws in tributary arguments and grievances from years before – all quite incomprehensible to any but the two people they concern most nearly. Neither party is ever proved right or wrong in such a case, or, if they are, what does it signify? 

Susanna Clarke, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell

 

Who overcomes by force hath overcome but half his foe.

Satan, Paradise Lost by Milton

Woke

The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys

Traffic

Power

Power is not a means; it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship. The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power.

George Orwell, 1984

Nor did He lie asleep before the Word sounded above these waters; ‘before’ and ‘after’ did not exist until His voice was heard. Pure essence, and pure matter, and the two joined into one were shot forth without flaw, like three bright arrows from a three-string bow. 

Dante, The Divine Comedy

The Seven Virtues

Charity, Faith, and Hope.  Prudence, Justice, Fortitude, and Temperance.

Dante, The Divine Comedy