There was no harder-boiled materialist than I; I rejected Marxism as too mystical and not materialistic enough. - L. Sprague de Camp

We rented an apartment in a rambly wooden-frame building, a block from the beach. This was before the waterfront sprouted a host of huge condominiums, like a plague of concrete mushrooms.

Let me tell you a little secret. A man’s ability as a swordsman of the other kind, to borrow your words, hinges much upon his health of body and peace of mind. If you’d fain cause his—ah—resolution to droop, you have but oft to berate him in harsh and wounding terms. If you’re fain to have him serve you with vigor, flatter and praise him; make him think himself worthier than in his heart he knows himself to be.

Obeying its natural instincts, it would have snapped up a tasty citizen or two. Then nought would have dissuaded your thick-skulled military from slaying the beast, as if one mountain dragon were not worth a score of human beings.
Thorolf raised his eyebrows. "How reckon you that?"
"The mountain dragon is an endangered species, whereas the world swarms with humanity. Man is in no danger of extermination, unless it destroy itself any devilish novel weapons like those Serican thunder tubes I hear of. It would serve the species right."
Thorolf gave a quiet laugh. "I never thought of it thus. Doubtless being human has warped my thinking.