“The [articles of the Genva Convention] adopted by The International Committee drew upon...the codes of a warrior's honour...these codes vary from culture to culture and their common features are the oldest artifacts of human morality: from Christian chivalry... to the Japanese Bushido or way of the warrior... The codes acknowledged the moral paradox of battle: that those who fight ...bravely are bound [by]...mutual respect...”

“Rather than offering a strict moral code to live by, popular culture today provides more of a moral posture.”

“Most moral philosophers consciously or unconsciously assume the essential correctness of our cultural sexual code — family, monogamy, continence, the postulate of privacy, ... restriction of intercourse to the marriage bed, etcetera. Having stipulated our cultural code as a whole, they fiddle with details - even such piffle as solemnly discussing whether or not the female breast is an "obscene" sight! But mostly they debate how the human animal can be induced or forced to obey this code, blandly ignoring the high probability that the heartaches and tragedies they see all around them originate in the code itself rather than the failure to abide by the code.”

“There are indeed moral universals — the Hebrew Bible calls them ‘the covenant with Noah’ and they form the basis of modern codes of human rights. But they exist to create space for cultural and religious difference…”

“What on earth prompted you to take a hand in this?""I don't know. My… my code of morals, perhaps.""Your code of morals. What code, if I may ask?""Comprehension.”

“Our code is different from the warrior code. It reaches across boundaries. To us, every cat is simply that — a cat, with the same right to life as any other. We made a promise to heal and protect, remember?”