Well, perhaps they knew--and perhaps they did n't.
The chance that they were right made it worth while to go to church on
Sunday, and to confession sometimes; to have one's children baptized; to
avoid giving offense to the clergy; and to make sure of their good
offices when one came to die. But the belief in their heaven and hell
was not strong enough to very much expel the greed, sloth, lust, avarice,
pride to which men were prone.

That same silent practical unbelief has been equally prevalent under all
the forms of Protestant supernaturalism. Part of it, no doubt, may be
referred to the difficulty with which human nature responds to any appeal
to look much beyond the immediate present. But in great part too it
springs from a suspicion of unreality in that supernatural world which
the preacher so fluently and fervently declares.

It may be said that in a more ignorant and credulous age the mass of men
did believe unquestioningly in the teachings of the church. But what
hardly admits of debate is the misconception which the mediaeval church's
doctrine involved as to some of the cardinal facts of life.

This religion dealt with such primary facts of real life as the human
body and its laws, the passion of sex, productive industry, the
organization of society,--in short, with all the impulses, instincts, and
powers of man,--through a cloud of misapprehension.

The central misconception was the idea that this life is only significant
as the antechamber to another. Hence its occupations, responsibilities,
joys, and troubles are of little account except as they are directly
related to the other life. This naturally bred a false attitude toward
many of the subjects which both actually and of right do largely engage
the attention of men.

The body was regarded as not the servant but the enemy of the spirit.
The highest state was celibacy, and marriage was a concession to human
weakness.

Study of nature was an unprofitable pursuit. The charter of divine truth
was the Bible, and its interpreter was the church. Since this world was
only the scene of a brief discipline, and was itself to pass away, it was
idle to spend much study on it.

Speculative thought was profitable only so long as it was a mere
elucidation of the dogmas of the church. As soon as those dogmas were
even remotely questioned, the thinker's soul was in peril. In repressing
heretical suggestions by the sternest measures, the church was
discha