Providence has been pleased to give this one connected country to one united people a people descended from the same ancestors, speaking the same language, professing the same religion, attached to the same principles of government, very similar in their manners and customs . . . This country and this people seem to have been made for each other, and it appears as if it was the design of Providence, that an inheritance so proper and convenient for a band of brethren, united to each other by the strongest ties, should never be split into a number of unsocial, jealous, and alien sovereignties.
42.
Of " Eltingville's " humor, he has stated that " The humor is supposed to hit close to home, " Eltingville "'s a joke but it's supposed to be an uncomfortable one, it's not about cuddly, cute, awkward fans, it's always been about the unsocial, self-absorbed, arrogant little tyrants that make fandom a less fun place, the idiots who make death threats to creators and rape threats against women writing about sexism in the video game industry, who flip out about the casting of an actor playing a fictional character, who argue the most ridiculous points of trivia as if they honestly matter in the scheme of things, who put fantasy above reality and don't know how to behave like credible human beings and go bonkers if they're called on that behavior.
43.
Edward Gibbon in his " The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire " discusses the topic in considerable detail in his famous Chapter Fifteen, summarizing the historical causes of the early success of Christianity as follows : " ( 1 ) The inflexible, and, if we may use the expression, the intolerant zeal of the Christians, derived, it is true, from the Jewish religion, but purified from the narrow and unsocial spirit which, instead of inviting, had deterred the Gentiles from embracing the law of Moses . ( 2 ) The doctrine of a future life, improved by every additional circumstance which could give weight and efficacy to that important truth . ( 3 ) The miraculous powers ascribed to the primitive church . ( 4 ) The pure and austere morals of the Christians . ( 5 ) The union and discipline of the Christian republic, which gradually formed an independent and increasing state in the heart of the Roman empire ."
