 In her essay " The Structure of the Moral Dilemma in Shiloh " for Children 's Literature , Claudia Mills wrote that Shiloh deals with " consequentialism pitted against deontological respect for moral duty " . Taught from his youth to be respectful to others and worship God , Marty is confounded by the injustice of Shiloh 's being abused . He seeks to justify his unethical actions by thinking that " [ a ] lie don 't seem a lie anymore when it 's meant to save a dog . " <unk> base the worthiness of a person 's act on its result . Marty 's act of saving Shiloh is worse for Shiloh 's well @-@ being . After Shiloh is concealed in the woods , a German shepherd attacks the beagle , causing to become permanently lame . Marty laments : " Worst of all , I 'd brought Shiloh here to keep him from being hurt , and what that German shepherd done to him was probably worse than anything Judd Travers would have brought himself to do , short of shootin ' him , anyways . " 
