One could not always put safety up front as the prime goal. Do that, and who would ever achieve anything of note?

Of course, they (i. e., demons) had always been observed with some regularity, but that could usually be ascribed to an overabundance of piety or wine or imagination. Take your pick.

It can provide horrendous weapons to idiots.

Technological civilizations don't last long. You're all right until you get a printing press. Then a race starts between technology and common sense. And maybe technology always wins.

Faith has its price. When misfortune strikes the true believer, he assumes he has done something to deserve punishment, but isn't quite certain what. The realist, recognizing that he lives in a Darwinian universe, is simply grateful to have made it to another sunset.

Truth, beaten down, may well rise again. But there's a reason it gets beaten down. Usually, we don't like it very much.

The measure of a civilization is in the courage, not of its soldiers, but of its bystanders.