Jackson Theofore Keys

“The Fideles operate on much the same principle,” she went on, disregarding his interruption. “You think they are pure and simple and good—and you’re right, they are all these things. But is it hard to be pure and simple and good? Is it hard to accept the doctrine, the code, laid out to the final letter of deportment? When you are told what to wear, what to eat, what to think, what to do on a daily basis—when there is no leeway at any juncture of any day for a person to make an individual decision—is that harder, I wonder, than to make those decisions every day, a hundred times a day, going by your own morality and your own judgment and balancing your desires against your sense of justice? I think the Fideles can be so pure because they have given up the struggle that makes the rest of us human beings, Lieutenant. Maybe they have resigned the struggle in favor of this great ‘goodness’ that you are impressed by. But that does not make them better people than those who are still struggling.”
― Sharon Shinn, Wrapt in Crystal