£be jfruitage of Beauty. 2 1 3 



it and ought to have it ; and of course I would be the 

 first to admit that they who are altogether or largely 

 deficient in aptness for this enjoyment and culture 

 are great losers in the experience of life. 



The Dominie. I am inclined to think that they 

 lose more than mere enjoyment. I have grown to 

 feel that the love of nature and its beauty and inner 

 life have much to do with the enrichment of the 

 religious life. Religion has been the gainer both 

 from science and art, for these interpreters of nature 

 have broadened our vision, lifted our ideals, and 

 expanded all our conceptions of the universe and of 

 its Creator. 



Lisbeth. But people can be religious without 

 having this love of nature and its beauties. Did the 

 Puritans care much for nature ? 



The Wife. And were not men devout and even 

 nobly inspired in religious feeling, long before they 

 knew much science or art ? What did David owe to 

 the doctrine of evolution, or to Corot or Constable ? 



The Dominie. Not too fast, please, either with 

 questions or conclusions ! I only spoke of the en- 

 largement of religious ideas through contact with 

 nature. The Puritan would have been a more re- 

 ligious man if he had been more susceptible to these 

 beauties of the outward. And as for David 



Adelaide. Now don't try to tell us that we have 

 outgrown the Psalms, and that Spencer's First Princi- 

 ples is grander than the Nineteenth Psalm. I will 

 not listen to any such nonsense. 



