— I can't stand people. I hate them.
— Oh, yeah?
— You hate them?
— No, but I seem to feel better when they're not around.
One of the most horrible features of war is that all the war-propaganda, all the screaming and lies and hatred, comes invariably from people who are not fighting.
If all the world hated you, and believed you wicked, while your own conscience approved you, and absolved you from guilt, you would not be without friends.
You and I seek the same thing. We are trying to establish the peace that Jiraiya Sensei so desired. You and I are not different at all. We each act according to our own sense justice. The justice I delivered to the Leaf Village is no different from what you are trying to do to me. The pain of losing something dear to you is the same. And both of us know that pain all too well. You have your justice, and I have mine. We are both ordinary men, driven to seek vengeance under the banner of justice. However, if there is justice in vengeance, then justice will only breed more vengeance. And trigger a cycle of hatred. We are living in the middle of such a phenomenom right now. We know what the past has been and we can predict what the future will be. That is history as we know it. So we cannot help but believe that human beings are incapable of understanding each other. The world of the ninja is ruled by hatred.
Episode 165
— Over the course of several hundred years, I’ve seen many ages end, conflict between people, hatred, wicked hearts. I always have hope that the new age will purify all of that. How many times has it happened? People repeat themselves. They commit the same mistakes, over and over…
— Despite this, they've survived.
— They haven’t survived, not in a true sense.