Or even to be an atheistic priest!"

That is a stock argument with many good and
fairly intelligent church folks. They hand it out with
so naive, not to say self-righteous assurance to the
heretical thinker who dares to state disbelief in their
special creed. They will say, "If I believed as you do,
I'd go in for having a good time," and frequently a
list of forbidden things is named, things that for
them would fill the bill for a good time. To this
remark a gray-haired, placid-faced woman sitting on
the piazza of a summer hotel, surrounded by a group
of students, some of them theological, answered;



BROWNING CRITIQUES 125

"I am having a good time. I have fairly good
health, money enough to come here for a few weeks,
and in short to do anything I care to do, in having a
good time."

"But," it was objected, "many people would do a lot
of other sorts of things if it were not for their re-
ligious belief."

"So I understand," was answered, "and I see what
the churches are for, though I am sorry to confess it,
that they must be to restrain the naturally vicious.
