...is war ? (...) what is it, but the getting together of quiet and harmless people, with their swords in their hands, to keep the ambitious and the turbulent within bounds ? (Laurence Sterne ,Tristram Shandy, 1760) nb : the cypress is a funeral tree : once cut, it never...

...by Nature — that he is so by necessity ? — For what is war ; what is it, Yorick, when fought as ours has been, upon principles of liberty, and upon...what is it, but the getting together of quiet and harmless people with their swords in their hands, to keep the ambitious and turbulent within bounds...