The new Spanish city was now in a satisfactory state of defence, and Cortes devoted himself in earnest to the completion of other necessary affairs. Fortune seemed decidedly in his favor, but his excessive religious zeal came near ruining everything. Word was brought to him that human sacrifices were to take place in one of the temples of his allies. Enraged at their cruel superstition and that such an enormity should be attempted under his very eyes, he rushed to the temple with some of his soldiers and threatened destruction by fire and sword if they did not instantly release the intended victims. His zeal did not stop with this. He demanded that the priests should pull down their idols, and renounce their false religion forever, although they did not yet know of a better one. The priests prostrated themselves at his feet, moaning and lamenting, and the caciques present trembled. As they refused to pull down their idols, he ordered his soldiers to do it by force. The priests rushed to arms and in a few moments Cortes and his little band were surrounded by a crowd big enough to appall the heart of the stoutest. But Cortes remained unmoved and announced to the assembled multitude that the first arrow fired by them would cost them the lives of their caciques and the destruction of them all. The soldiers advanced to carry out his orders. In an instant the idols were hurled down; the sacred vessels and the altar followed them. They were all destroyed, and the temple was cleaned. The human blood which adhered to the walls was washed off, and the image of the Virgin was set in the place of the idols. The astonished Indians expected that fire would descend from heaven any instant and revenge this indignity to their divinities. But not a spark was seen, and the temple-stormers continued their work audaciously and triumphantly before their very eyes. This weakened their faith and caused them to reflect, with the result that they gradually came to believe that the Spaniards were divinities themselves and mightier than their own gods. They did not long stop to consider, but, gathering up the remnants of their idols, contemptuously threw them into the fire. The temple was consecrated as a Christian church and upon the same day was dedicated with Roman Catholic ceremonies, which the Indians greatly wondered at though they did not understand them.