One Corpse Too Many (Chronicles of Brother Cadfael, #2)

by Ellis Peters

life could only be sustained by refusing to let it be disrupted, by war, catastrophe or death.

The ugliness that man can do to man might cast a shadow between you and the certainty of the justice and mercy God can do to him hereafter. It takes half a lifetime to reach the spot where eternity is always visible, and the crude injustice of the hour shrivels out of sight.

every untimely death, every man cut down in his vigour and strength without time for repentance and reparation, is one corpse too many.