or instance, if a man has expressed his annoyance at any
interruption or other petty inconvenience, there will be no lack of
people who for that very reason will bring it about: _animal mechant
par excellence_! This is so certain that a man should be careful not
to express any annoyance at small evils. On the other hand he should
also be careful not to express his pleasure at any trifle, for, if
he does so, men will act like the jailer who, when he found that his
prisoner had performed the laborious task of taming a spider, and took
a pleasure in watching it, immediately crushed it under his foot:
_l'animal mechant par excellence_! This is why all animals are
instinctively afraid of the sight, or even of the track of a man, that
_animal mechant par excellence_! nor does their instinct them false;
for it is man alone who hunts game for which he has no use and which
does him no harm.

It is a fact, then, that in the heart of every man there lies a wild
beast which only waits for an opportunity to storm and rage, in its
desire to inflict pain on others, or, if they stand in his way, to
kill them. It is this which is the source of all the lust of war and
battle. In trying to tame and to some extent hold it in check, the
intelligence, its appointed keeper, has always enough to do. People
may, if they please, call it the radical evil of human nature--a
name which will at least serve those with whom a word stands for an
explanation. I say, however, that it is the will to live, which, more
and more embittered by the constant sufferings of existence, seeks to
alleviate its own torment by causing torment in others. But in this
way a man gradually develops in himself real cruelty and malice. The
observation may also be added that as, according to Kant, matter
subsists only through the antagonism of the powers of expansion and
contraction, so human society subsists only by the antagonism of
hatred, or anger, and fear. For there is a moment in the life of
all of us when the malignity of our nature might perhaps make us
murderers, if it were not accompanied by a due admixture of fear to
keep it within bounds; and this fear, again, would make a man the
sport and laughing stock of every boy, if anger were not lying ready
in him, and keeping watch.

But it is _Schadenfreude_, a mischievous delight in the misfortunes of
others, which remains the worst trait in human nature. It is a feeling
which is closely akin to cruelty, and differs