up with priests and gods when man becomes scientific!" Priests used the concepts of "sin," "guilt," and "punishment" to oppose knowledge, science, and the concepts of cause and effect. Sinful, suffering humans believe in supernatural agents. Such sinners are dependent on their priests for salvation, redemption, and forgiveness. "[T]he priest rules through the invention of sin." Psychology of belief Belief is "a sign of décadence, of a broken will to live." The Christian "proof by power" is that "[f]aith makes blessed: therefore it is true." However, blessedness is something that the priest merely promises, not demonstrated; "it hangs upon "faith" as a condition—one shall be blessed because one believes." Blessedness—or, more technically, pleasure—can never be a proof of truth: "proof by 'pleasure' is a proof of 'pleasure'—nothing more; why in the world should it be assumed that true judgments give more pleasure than false ones...?" Nietzsche summarizes, "[f]aith makes blessed: therefore, it lies...." Illness Nietzsche alleges that "one is not "converted" to Christianity—one must first be sick enough for it." The decadent and sick types of people came to power through Christianity. From everywhere, the aggregate of the sick accumulated in Christianity and outnumbered the healthy. "The majority became master; democracy, with its Christian instincts, triumphed." The meaning of the God on the Cross is that "[e]verything that suffers, everything that hangs on the cross, is divine." Nietzsche continues: Since sickness is inherent in Christianity, it follows that the typically Christian state of "faith" must be a form of sickness too, and that all straight, straightforward and scientific paths to knowledge must be banned by the church as forbidden ways. Doubt is thus a sin from the start.Knowledge requires caution, intellectual moderation, discipline, and self–overcoming. Christianity, however, uses sick reasoning, like Martyrdom, to try to prove its truth. Christians think "that there must be something in a cause for which any one goes to his death." Nietzsche responds to this notion by quoting a passage from his own Zarathustra:Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Part II, "Of the Priests" To Nietzsche, "the need of faith, of something unconditioned by yea or nay...is a need of weakness." The Holy Lie and belief Lying, or not wanting to see as one sees, is a trait of those who are devoted to a party or faction. Lying is used by all priests, be they pagan, Jewish, or Christian:[T]he right to lie and the shrewd dodge of