{"id":"01KG8AK98QN0GW223WS18DSBE7","cid":"bafkreifwoouvdv26eeu37dhirotj4ixerllmw4ijcf6xm6fwg5bt7sl4ym","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":8368,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T20:47:57.725Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 2","source_file":"01KG89J1JMR8XVKPA0G8ADAPC4","start_line":8310,"text":"change personalities with him? to feel what it was to be a snake? to\r\nglide unsuspected in grass? to sting, to kill at a touch; your whole\r\nbeautiful body one iridescent scabbard of death? In short, did the wish\r\nnever occur to you to feel yourself exempt from knowledge, and\r\nconscience, and revel for a while in the carefree, joyous life of a\r\nperfectly instinctive, unscrupulous, and irresponsible creature?\"\r\n\r\n\"Such a wish,\" replied the other, not perceptibly disturbed, \"I must\r\nconfess, never consciously was mine. Such a wish, indeed, could hardly\r\noccur to ordinary imaginations, and mine I cannot think much above the\r\naverage.\"\r\n\r\n\"But now that the idea is suggested,\" said the stranger, with infantile\r\nintellectuality, \"does it not raise the desire?\"\r\n\r\n\"Hardly. For though I do not think I have any uncharitable prejudice\r\nagainst the rattle-snake, still, I should not like to be one. If I were\r\na rattle-snake now, there would be no such thing as being genial with\r\nmen--men would be afraid of me, and then I should be a very lonesome and\r\nmiserable rattle-snake.\"\r\n\r\n\"True, men would be afraid of you. And why? Because of your rattle, your\r\nhollow rattle--a sound, as I have been told, like the shaking together\r\nof small, dry skulls in a tune of the Waltz of Death. And here we have\r\nanother beautiful truth. When any creature is by its make inimical to\r\nother creatures, nature in effect labels that creature, much as an\r\napothecary does a poison. So that whoever is destroyed by a\r\nrattle-snake, or other harmful agent, it is his own fault. He should\r\nhave respected the label. Hence that significant passage in Scripture,\r\n'Who will pity the charmer that is bitten with a serpent?'\"\r\n\r\n\"_I_ would pity him,\" said the cosmopolitan, a little bluntly, perhaps.\r\n\r\n\"But don't you think,\" rejoined the other, still maintaining his\r\npassionless air, \"don't you think, that for a man to pity where nature\r\nis pitiless, is a little presuming?\"\r\n\r\n\"Let casuists decide the casuistry, but the compassion the heart decides\r\nfor itself. But, sir,\" deepening in seriousness, \"as I now for the first\r\nrealize, you but a moment since introduced the word irresponsible in a\r\nway I am not used to. Now, sir, though, out of a tolerant spirit, as I\r\nhope, I try my best never to be frightened at any speculation, so long\r\nas it is pursued in honesty, yet, for once, I must acknowledge that you\r\ndo really, in the point cited, cause me uneasiness; because a proper\r\nview of the universe, that view which is suited to breed a proper\r\nconfidence, teaches, if I err not, that since all things are justly\r\npresided over, not very many living agents but must be some way\r\naccountable.\"\r\n\r\n\"Is a rattle-snake accountable?\" asked the stranger with such a\r\npreternaturally cold, gemmy glance out of his pellucid blue eye, that he\r\nseemed more a metaphysical merman than a feeling man; \"is a rattle-snake\r\naccountable?\"\r\n\r\n\"If I will not affirm that it is,\" returned the other, with the caution\r\nof no inexperienced thinker, \"neither will I deny it. But if we suppose\r\nit so, I need not say that such accountability is neither to you, nor\r\nme, nor the Court of Common Pleas, but to something superior.\"\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 2"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG8AJMVHXZ1WH9JRWME9D7FK","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG89J1JMR8XVKPA0G8ADAPC4","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG8AK98Q4F04NP2F84HJY656","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG8AK98QP9YBME4EMNDYQBD4","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T20:47:59.255Z","ts":"2026-01-30T20:48:13.292Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}