Why It Matters: Because the world is a sad and troubling and often extremely disappointing place and we may as well learn that as early as possible in life.

"It was in his nature to do it. The doctor says there are such boys springing up amongst us—boys of a sort unknown in the last generation—the outcome of new views of life. They seem to see all its terrors before they are old enough to have staying power to resist them. He says it is the beginning of the coming universal wish not to live."

- Thomas Hardy, basically talking about this kitten, in Jude the Obscure