 Philosophers, “heroes”, did not need Scripture’s bogus threats of retribution and promises of future rewards to cajole them into behaving morally. They understood the “pattern” (istoria) of Nature inscribed within [them]’ (BOI II, 24–25), that God, in other words, was with and within them (BOI I, 455–456; II, 658), and governed their actions accordingly. Those who considered the matter carefully, “truly religious men”, “men who were good by nature”, would see that Bruno’s philosophy, more than any other, “not only contained the truth but also favoured religion” (BOI I, 528). They did not need rituals involving some “food and drink” to revere the divine (BOL I.1, 205). On diverse occasions, he covertly mocked the eucharist, despising as he did the “subtleties” of scholastic accounts of transubstantiation (Spampanato 1933, 40). Instead, it was the majesty of Nature, the infinite animate universe, that inspired the wonder and reverence of truly divine men and led them to search for its cause (see  Section 5).  In so doing they became themselves “greater than those gods whom blind commoners worship” (BOI II, 24). Stripped, in short, of its false claims, Christianity could be seen for what it was, a “foolish faith and blind credulity” (BOI II, 386, 398), “a wretched story” (BOL I.2, 172), “a worthless, pernicious fable” (BOI II, 400), a continuation of Judaism, a religion invented by that “pestilent, leprous and wholly pernicious” race, the Jews (BOI II, 314–315; for similar stereotypical anti-Jewish comments, see Section 2 and the caveat there regarding the extent to which they reflect Bruno’s views). With its threats that the world would end and its stories of a God who wrought miracles at whim, it had cowed a “stupefied” world into despising Nature—“God in things”—and, “having smashed the tables of Nature” (cf. Exodus, 32:19), looked forward joyfully to the ruin of all things (BOL I.2 123).