pe. But there is another
explanation. He might be the right shape. Outrageously tall men might
feel him to be short. Very short men might feel him to be tall. Old
bucks who are growing stout might consider him insufficiently filled
out; old beaux who were growing thin might feel that he expanded beyond
the narrow lines of elegance. Perhaps Swedes (who have pale hair like
tow) called him a dark man, while negroes considered him distinctly
blonde. Perhaps (in short) this extraordinary thing is really the
ordinary thing; at least the normal thing, the centre. Perhaps, after
all, it is Christianity that is sane and all its critics that are
mad--in various ways. I tested this idea by asking myself whether there
was about any of the accusers anything morbid that might explain the
accusation. I was startled to find that this key fitted a lock. For
instance, it was certainly odd that the modern world charged
Christianity at once with bodily austerity and with artistic pomp. But
then it was also odd, very odd, that the modern world itself combined
extreme bodily luxury with an extreme absence of artistic pomp. The
modern man thought Becket's robes too rich and his meals too poor. But
then the modern man was really exceptional in history; no man before
ever ate such elaborate dinners in such ugly clothes. The modern man
found the church too simple exactly where modern life is too complex; he
found the church too gorgeous exactly where modern life is too dingy.
The man who disliked the plain fasts and feasts was mad on _entrees_.
The man who disliked vestments wore a pair of preposterous trousers. And
surely if there was any insanity involved in the matter at all it was in
the trousers, not in the simply falling robe. If there was any insanity
at all, it was in the extravagant _entrees_, not in the bread and wine.

I went over all the cases, and I found the key fitted so far. The fact
that Swinburne was irritated at the unhappiness of Christians and yet
more irritated at their happiness was easily explained. It was no longer
a complication of diseases in Christianity, but a complication of
diseases in Swinburne. The restraints of Christians saddened him simply
because he was more hedonist than a healthy man should be. The faith of
Christians angered him because he was more pessimist than a healthy man
should be. In the same way the Malthusians by instinct attacked
Christianity; not because there is anything especially anti-Malthusi