Hatred is never appeased by hatred in this world. By non-hatred alone is hatred appeased. This is a law eternal.

This is the verse that has crossed civilizations — into the speeches of Martin Luther King Jr., into Hannah Arendt's reading of forgiveness, into the foundations of restorative justice. The word translated as "law eternal" is sanantano dhammo — the always-was-and-always-will-be of things. The teaching does not depend on belief in the speaker. It is offered as observation: hatred does not consume hatred. Only non-hatred consumes it. The verse names a physical truth and does not argue it.