"Is there then any shame in acknowledging weakness?" demanded the
German, pushing him as hard as he was able. "It certainly is honest."
"Is there any shame to formulating fear?" retorted the other, deftly evading him.
"Then see how religion always appeals to art to help out its ultimate expression," observed Rangely.
"And how it has failed," added Bently, "when it has not had art to help it. Puritanism tried to get on without art, and where is Puritanism? You couldn't find a trace of it, if it hadn't come down on its marrow-bones and begged art to build its churches, compose its music, and regulate its rituals."
"It is no more fair to say that," objected another Pagan, doggedly, "than to say that art has gone to religion for help. Their accounts are pretty evenly balanced."
"Nonsense!" Rangely returned. "Art has never gained by being religious, but by being art; but religion owes its hold largely to the help art has given it."
"And it has paid its debts by blackguarding art from every pulpit it has builded for it."
"As Fenton used to say," Ainsworth remarked, "art has been used as the sugar-coating to the bitter pill of religion."
"Oh, Fenton again," Bently exclaimed impatiently. "What did you bring him up for? Who the devil would have thought Fenton would have turned out so?"
"I can tell you a piece of news," said Rangely. "The Election Committee blackballed Calvin this afternoon."