“Christianity, was as consistent, tried to repress the disposition to unbelief, in its opinion the most fruitful source of vice. The disposition to unbelief was regarded as the deadliest symptom of the natural, unconverted heart. To counteract it by an opposite disposition to belief was tedious and difficult, and the method of repression was resorted to. The civic power was enlisted in the work of exterminating pernicious error. Tribunals were created, laws were passed, judges and executioners were appointed, penalties were devised, heretical schools were broken up, heretical books were burned, heretical teachers were banished, silenced, incarcerated, consigned to the flames. Whole provinces were devastated, towns were destroyed, populations turned adrift to perish; the entire field of unorthodox thought was ploughed over and sown with salt. And what was the result of the method, carried out on this vast scale, with full ecclesiastical and civil powers--the sacred and the secular authorities combining, the sympathy of the Christian world aiding, no public opinion opposing, the resources of wealth conspiring with the resources of fanaticism, to make the policy of suppression effective? The issue is familiar to all who care to know the truth, from the reports of historians, who have made it their business to ascertain and tell the facts. They certainly do not bear out the conclusion that the method of suppression is wise, or even practical. On the contrary, they suggest the opinion that it is impractical as it is unwise. The failure of the method was so disastrous that it quite defeated the ends. “If one thing is demonstrated by human history, it is this:--the attempt to suppress human nature, under any form, so it be nature that is suppressed, is futile. The old proverbs, which say, ‘Drive nature out at the door, and she comes in at the window;’ ‘You cannot expel nature with a fork;’ hold out a truth that is for all time.... Deeply rooted propensities, habits which have become a second nature, cannot be thus dealt with. No Hercules’ club will avail to kill the vital principle that grows venomous heads faster than they can be bruised. The effort to suppress nature by violent measures, is always followed, always produces a reaction, that is exactly proportioned in strength to the effort, and fairly balances it. Healthy progress is slow, gradual, measured, according to the sure conditions of cause and effect. It consists of a long line of close sequences, knit together, not mechanically, like a chain, but organically, like a muscle or a nerve. Every inch of growth implies a preceding inch of growth; there is no such thing as jump or leap from point to point. You do not make the elastic band longer by stretching it; you but loosen the cohesion of its parts; the strain being relaxed, the band resumes its first condition; the strain being continued, the band looses its elasticity and breaks. There is no more power than there is.”