"And what would mine be, pray," asked one of the colorless young ladies. "I will sum it up in one sentence, Miss Jones--'Keep in the fashion.'" "I think that you are very unjust. I'm sure I go to church regularly, and attend a great many services in Lent and on Saints' days. I've been confirmed, and all that." "Yes, it is the thing to do in your set. Now, here is Miss Winthrop, a Presbyterian, who manifests quite another religious phase." "Pray what is mine?" asked that lady, laughing. "Oh, you want hair-splitting in regard to the high doctrines--clear, brilliant arguments, cutting like sharp, merciless steel into the beliefs of other denominations. Then, after your ism has been glorified for an hour on Sunday morning, and all other isms pierced and lashed, you descend from your intellectual heights, eat a good dinner, take a nap, and live like the rest of us till the next Sabbath, when (if it is a fine day) you climb some other theological peak, far beyond the limits of perpetual snow, and there take another bird's-eye view of something that might be found very different if you were nearer to it." "And what is my phase?" asked Miss Brown. "Oh, you are an out-and-out sinner, and do just what you please, in spite of priest or prayer-book," said Christine, with a laugh in which all the ladies joined. "Well," said Miss Brown, "I do not think that I am worse than the rest of you." "Not in the least," replied Christine. "We all have some form of religion, or none at all, as it accords with our peculiar tastes." "And you mean to say that having a religion or not is a mere matter of taste?" asked Miss Winthrop. "Yes, I should say it was, and practically that it _is_. You ladies, and nearly all that I have met, seem to choose a style of religion suited to your tastes; and the tastes of many incline them to have no religion at all." "Why, Miss Ludolph!" exclaimed Miss Winthrop, her cheeks glowing with honest dissent and zeal for the truth; "our religion is taken from the Bible. Do you not believe in the Bible?" "No! not in the sense in which you ask the question; nor you either, my charming Miss Winthrop." "Indeed I do, every word of it," said the orthodox young lady, hotly.