sdi

It was widely believed that Christian fanatics had from time to time actually tried to light fires which should consume the accursed world

I am reminded of the Trinity nuclear test, which some of those involved worried could potentially ignite the atmosphere and destroy biological life. "Insane crime made worse by diabolical motive" strikes me as being the correct term for such a thing, but then don't those words describe nearly the entirety of the last century? The world in which we live has become like Wonderland:

[Alice] tried another question. "What sort of people live about here?"

"In that direction," the [Cheshire] Cat said, waving its right paw round, "lives a Hatter: and in that direction," waving the other paw, "lives a March Hare. Visit either you like: they're both mad."

"But I don't want to go among mad people," Alice remarked.

"Oh, you can't help that," said the Cat: "we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad."

"How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice.

"You must be," said the Cat, "or you wouldn't have come here."

So if we are in times like Sallustius, I think it all the more appropriate to be studying his words, and the spirit in which he made them, with care!