Machiavelli was always considering the practical problem, how is Italy to be saved? - Neville Figgis

It is the transformation of the desire to persecute into the claim of an inherent right to exist on the part of religious bodies that historically produces those limitations upon State actual which are the securities of freedom.

Were the heavens ever opened and a glimpse of the world beyond vouchsafed to men's wondering eyes?

The universe contemplated by religion is by no means self-contained or self-sufficient, it is dependent for its origin and maintenance, as we are for daily bread and future hopes, upon the power and good-will of a being or beings of which science has no knowledge.