But Smith had already learned that these creatures, so much like himself in some ways, could endure emotions dreadful to contemplate and still not die.  His Brother Mahmoud underwent a spiritual agony five times daily and not only did not die but had urged the agony on him as a needful thing.  His Brother Captain van Tromp suffered terrifying spasms unpredictably, any one of which should have, by Smith's standards, produced immediate discorporation to end the conflict - yet that brother was still corporate so far as he knew.