idea: why not
kill him as he killed the beasts? I struck; and he died, just as they
did. Then I gave up your old silly drudging ways, and lived as he had
lived, by the chase, by the killing, and by the fire. Am I not better
than you? stronger, happier, freer?

ADAM. You are not stronger: you are shorter in the wind: you cannot
endure. You have made the beasts afraid of us; and the snake has
invented poison to protect herself against you. I fear you myself. If
you take a step towards your mother with that spear of yours I will
strike you with my spade as you struck Abel.

EVE. He will not strike me. He loves me.

ADAM. He loved his brother. But he killed him.

CAIN. I do not want to kill women. I do not want to kill my mother. And
for her sake I will not kill you, though I could send this spear through
you without coming within reach of your spade. But for her, I could not
resist the sport of trying to kill you, in spite of my fear that you
would kill me. I have striven with a boar and with a lion as to which of
us should kill the other. I have striven with a man: spear to spear and
shield to shield. It is terrible; but there is no joy like it. I call
it fighting. He who has never fought has never lived. That is what has
brought me to my mother today.

ADAM. What have you to do with one another now? She is the creator, you
the destroyer.

CAIN. How can I destroy unless she creates? I want her to create more
and more men: aye, and more and more women, that they may in turn create
more men. I have imagined a glorious poem of many men, of more men than
there are leaves on a thousand trees. I will divide them into two great
hosts. One of them I will lead; and the other will be led by the man I
fear most and desire to fight and kill most. And each host shall try
to kill the other host. Think of that! all those multitudes of men
fighting, fighting, killing, killing! The four rivers running with
blood! The shouts of triumph! the howls of rage! the curses of despair!
the shrieks of torment! That will be life indeed: life lived to the very
marrow: burning, overwhelming life. Every man who has not seen it, heard
it, felt it, risked it, will feel a humbled fool in the presence of the
man who has.

EVE. And I! I am to be a mere convenience to make men for you to kill!

ADAM. Or to kill you, you fool.

CAIN. Mother: the making of men is your right, your risk, your agony,
your glory, your triumph. You make my father here yo