n-hole.' That is the proper way in which a woman should treat
fame--merely as a decoration for the man whom she has chosen."

"O noble judge! O excellent young woman!" exclaimed Christopher. "But
what are some of the wonderful things which you are so anxious to
teach?"

Elisabeth's mood changed at once, and her face grew serious. "I want to
teach people that they were sent into the world to be happy, and not to
be miserable; and that there is no virtue in turning their backs to the
sunshine and choosing to walk in the shade. I want to teach people that
the world is beautiful, and that it is only a superficial view that
finds it common and unclean. I want to teach people that human nature is
good and not evil, and that life is a glorious battlefield and not a
sordid struggle. In short, I want to teach people the dignity of
themselves; and there is no grander lesson."

"Except, perhaps, the unworthiness of themselves," suggested
Christopher.

"No, no, Chris; you are wrong to be so hard and cynical. Can't you
understand how I am longing to help the men and women I see around me,
who are dying for want of joy and beauty in their lives? It is the old
struggle between Hellenism and Hebraism--between happiness and
righteousness. We are sorely in need, here in England to-day, of the
Greek spirit of Pantheism, which found God in life and art and nature,
'as well as in sorrow and renunciation and death."

"But it is in sorrow and renunciation and death that we need Him; and
you, who have always had everything you want, can not understand this:
no more could the Pagans and the Royalists; but the early Christians and
the persecuted Puritans could."

"Puritanism has much to answer for in England," said Elisabeth; "we have
to thank Puritanism for teaching men that only by hurting themselves can
they please their Maker, and that God has given them tastes and hopes
and desires merely in order to mortify the same. And it is all
false--utterly false. The God of the Pagan is surely a more merciful
Being than the God of the Puritan."

"A more indulgent Being, perhaps, but not necessarily a more merciful
one, Elisabeth. I disagree with the Puritans on many points, but I can
not help admitting that their conception of God was a fine one, even
though it erred on the side of severity. The Pagan converted the Godhead
into flesh, remember; but the Puritan exalted manhood into God."

"Still, I never could bear the Puritans," Elisabeth we