"Is that how you would have it preached?"
"If gospels had to wait for the wise and prudent," said Jenifer, "they would wait till eternity. That woman was speaking not for an institution but for a movement."
"Do not such exaggerations condemn it?"
"By no means; if some did not exaggerate none of us would get a hearing—especially if we happened to be in a minority; and reformers always are."
"Though I embroider it for myself," said Prince Max, "from others I prefer to get plain truth."
"Plain truth," she replied, "is only that manner of dealing with a thing—with some wrong, say—which makes it plain to people that the wrong exists. Short of that you haven't got truth into them."
"Now you are preaching pragmatism," said Max.
"Do you suppose," she went on, "that to that dull, sunk, slow-witted crowd we have been looking at, a mere niggardly statement of facts would make the truth plain, or stir them to any action or feeling for others? That woman on some points over-stated her case quite ridiculously—especially as to the benefits and rewards which the women's Charter would bring—but the effect upon her hearers fell far short of what the real facts justify. Oh, people have to be bribed even to do no more than open their ears to the truth."
"By false promises of reward? Yes, you have the Church with you there. It deals with our ordinary everyday morality, in very much the same way. Tells a maximum of untruth so that a necessary minimum may spring out of it. How many Christians to-day really believe in the doctrine of hell?"
"Surely," she said, "to see the light of its fires in so many faces is proof enough."