As time went on, great difficulties showed themselves in the way of this compromise--difficulties theological not less than difficulties scientific.

To a Catholic it was more and more hard to explain the theological grounds why so many orthodox cities, firm in the faith, were punished, and so many heretical cities spared; and why, in regions devoted to the Church, the poorer people, whose faith in theological fetiches was unquestioning, died in times of pestilence like flies, while sceptics so frequently escaped.

Difficulties of the same sort beset devoted Protestants; they, too, might well ask why it was that the devout peasantry in their humble cottages perished, while so much larger a proportion of the more sceptical upper classes were untouched.
Gradually it dawned both upon Catholic and Protestant countries that, if any sin be punished by pestilence, it is the sin of filthiness; more and more it began to be seen by thinking men of both religions that Wesley's great dictum stated even less than the truth; that not only was "cleanliness akin to godliness," but that, as a means of keeping off pestilence, it was far superior to godliness as godliness was then generally understood.( 338) (338) For Boyle's attempt at compromise, see Discourse on the Air, in his works, vol.iv, pp.

288, 289, cited by Buckle, vol.i, pp.

128, 129, note.
The recent history of sanitation in all civilized countries shows triumphs which might well fill us with wonder, did there not rise within us a far greater wonder that they were so long delayed.