The great majority of modern theologians adhere to the traditional teaching of the Church, whose columns and windows are still everywhere adorned with miracles. While a few liberal Protestants restrict their faith to the three fundamental dogmas, most of them still believe in the myths and legends which fill the pages of the gospels. This orthodoxy is, moreover, encouraged of late by the conservative and reactionary attitude taken up by many governments on political grounds. Most modern governments maintain the connection with the Church in the idea that the traditional belief in the miraculous is the best security for their own continuance. Throne and altar must protect and support each other. However, this conservative-Christian policy meets two obstacles in an increasing measure. On the one hand, the ecclesiastical hierarchy is always trying to set its spiritual power above the secular and make the state serve its own purposes; and, on the other hand, the modern right of popular representation affords an opportunity to make the voice of reason heard and oppose the reactionary conservatives with opportune reforms. The chief rulers and the ministers of public instruction, who have a great influence in this struggle, generally favor the teaching of the Church, not out of conviction of its truth, but because they think knowledge brings unrest, and because docile and ignorant subjects are easier to rule than educated and independent citizens. Hence it is that we now hear so much on every occasion, in speeches from the throne and at banquets, at the opening of churches and the unveiling of monuments, from able and influential speakers, of the value of faith. They would give the palm to faith in its struggle with knowledge. Thus we get this paradoxical situation in educated countries (such as Prussia), that encouragement is given at once to modern science and technical training and to the orthodox Church, which is its deadly enemy. As a rule, it is not stated in these florid orations to how many and what kind of miracles this precious faith must extend. Nevertheless, we may yet, in view of the spread of intellectual reaction in Germany, see it made obligatory for at least all priests, teachers, and other servants of the state to profess a belief in the three fundamental mysteries--the triune God of the catechism, the personal immortality of the soul, and the absolute freedom of the human will--and even in many of the other miracles which are found in the gospels, sacred legends, and religious journals of our time.