All the pretty machines

[Terrance]

Americans have ideas sometimes that are not so practical. They think
that there are good things and bad things. They are very superstitious. 

You don't think there are good things and bad things?

Things no. I think it is superstition. It is the superstition of a
godless people. 

You think Americans are godless? 

Oh Yes. Don't you?

No. 

I see them attack their own property. I saw a man one time destroy his
car. With a good martillo. What do you call it? 

Hammer. 

Because it would not start. Would a Mexican do that? 

I don't know. 

A Mexican would not do that. The Mexican does not believe that a car can
be good or evil. If there is evil in the car he knows that to destroy
the car is to accomplish nothing. Because he knows where good and evil
have their home. The anglo thinks in his rare way that the Mexican is
superstitious. But who is the one? We know there are qualities to a
thing. This car is green. Or it has a certain motor inside. But it
cannot be tainted, you see. Or a man. Even a man. There can be in a man
some evil. But we don't think it is his own evil. Where did he get it?
How did he come to claim it? No. Evil is a true thing in Mexico. It goes
about on its own legs. Maybe someday it will come to visit you. Maybe it
already has. 

McCarthy

A surviving primitive might, here and there, vent his anger on a cart
that got stuck in the mud by breaking up its wheels, in the same fashion
that he would beat a donkey that refused to move: but the mass of
mankind learned, at least during the period of the written record, that
certain parts of the environment can neither be intimidated nor cajoled.
To control them, one must learn the laws of their behavior, instead of
petulantly imposing one's own wishes. 

Mumford