“Civil order had collapsed. In reflection of the slipperiness and the utter perishability of their lives and works, they held on to nothing but their swords; no security offered itself. The relentless law of the harvest rolled upon them, and they lived out their remaining days like specters in a terrifying nightmare of anger—sickness, howling, stench, and blood. The lives they had chosen had filled them, not with desire for peace and abundant thriving life, but with hatred and self-destruction. The ultimate end of evil is death” (Thomas, “More Excellent Way,” 279–80).