The history of intellectual progress is written in the lives of
infidels. Political rights have been preserved by traitors--the liberty
of the mind by heretics. To attack the king was treason--to dispute the
priest was blasphemy. The sword and cross were allies. They defended
each other. The throne and the altar were twins--vultures from the same
egg. It was James I. who said: "No bishop, no king." He might have said:
"No cross, no crown." The king owned the bodies, and the priest the
souls, of men. One lived on taxes, the other on alms. One was a robber,
the other a beggar. These robbers and beggars controlled two worlds.
The king made laws, the priest made creeds. With bowed backs the people
received the burdens of the one, and, with wonder's open mouth, the
dogmas of the other. If any aspired to be free, they were slaughtered by
the king, and every priest was a Herod who slaughtered the children
of the brain. The king ruled by force, the priest by fear, and both by
both. The king said to the people: "God made you peasants, and He made
me king. He made rags and hovels for you, robes and palaces for me. Such
is the justice of God." And the priest said: "God made you ignorant and
vile. He made me holy and wise. If you do not obey me, God will punish
you here and torment you hereafter. Such is the mercy of God."