But for a certain number of heresies born and circulated among them, but for a constant stream of fresh thought, people holding by a literal religion would be a _caput mortuum_ in history, a little “like the faithful Tibetians of Dalaï-lama,” as Von Hartmann says. Literal religions cannot last and perpetuate themselves except by a series of compromises. There are always in the minds of the sincere and intelligent believer periods of advancement and of reaction, steps forward followed by a recoil. Confessors know these sudden changes well, and are prepared to deal with them and keep them within certain limits. They themselves are subject to such changes; how many of them have thought they believed and been suspected of heresy! If we could see into the bottom of their minds what reconciliations should we not perceive, what secret accommodations and compliances! There is in every one of us something that _protests_ against literal faith, and if this protestation is not explicit, it is often none the less real. No one can hope to read more exactly than he who reads between the lines. When one venerates and admires everything, it is generally what one simply does not understand. Very many minds positively like vagueness and accommodate themselves to it, they believe in gross and arrange the details to suit themselves; sometimes even, after accepting a thing as a whole, they eliminate one by one all its parts. Generally speaking, those who aspire to literal faith nowadays are divisible into three classes: the indifferent, the blind, and unconscious Protestants. [Sidenote: Protestantism and liberty of conscience.]