[...]

Marat/Sade (1963)

• Marat: I read in your books, De Sade, in one of your immortal works, that the animating force of nature is destruction. And that our only instrument for measuring life is death.
• De Sade: Correct, Marat. But man has given a false importance to death. Every animal, plant or man that dies adds to nature’s compost heap; becomes the manure of that which nothing could grow, nothing could be created… Death is simply part of the process. Every death - even the cruellest death - drowns in the total indifference of nature. Nature would watch, unmoved if we destroyed the entire human race.
• I hate nature. This passionless spectator, this unbreakable iceberg face that can bare everything; this goads us to greater and greater acts. But though I hate this goddess I see that the greatest acts in history have followed her laws. Nature teaches a man to fight for his own happiness, and if he must kill to gain that happiness, why, then murder is natural. Haven’t we always crushed down those weaker than ourselves? Haven’t we torn at the throats of the powerful with continuous villainy and lust? Haven’t we experimented in our laboratories before applying the final solution? Man is a destroyer. But if he kills and takes no pleasure in it, he is a machine; he should destroy with passion, like a man.
• Let me remind you of the execution of Darmiens after his unsuccessful attempt to assassinate Louis the Fifteenth, remember how Darmiens died? How gentle the guillotine is, compared with his torture? It lasted four hours while the crowd goggled and Casanova at an upper window felt under the skirts of the ladies watching. […] That was a festival but to which today’s festivals cannot compete. Even our inquisition has no meaning nowadays. Now it is all official, we condemn to death without emotion. And there is no singular, personal death to be had - only an anonymous, cheapened death that we can dole out to entire nations on a mathematical basis, until the time comes for all life to be extinguished.

Hunde tus uñas en la tierra.
Busca los huesos de tus muertos.
Arrópalos, tienen frío.
Limpia la hierba de sus bocas,
deja que digan su silencio.
Cómete las carnes que restan,
no dejes que se pudran sin sentido.
Ellos han muerto para que vivas.
No los dejes morir.