TREBELL.  Is it?  My brain works steadily on ... hasn’t failed me yet.  I keep it well fed. [He breathes deeply.] But I’m not sure one shouldn’t have been away from England for five years instead of five weeks ... to come back to a job like this with a fresh mind.  D’you know why really I went back on the Liberals over this question?  Not because they wanted the church money for their pensions ... but because all they can see in Disestablishment is destruction.  Any fool can destroy!  I’m not going to let a power like the Church get loose from the State.  A thirteen hundred years, tradition of service ... and all they can think of is to cut it adrift!

WEDGECROFT.  I think the Church is moribund.

TREBELL.  Oh, yes, of course you do ... you sentimental agnostic anarchist.  Nonsense!  The supernatural’s a bit blown upon ... till we re-discover what it means.  But it’s not essential.  Nor is the Christian doctrine.  Put a Jesuit in a corner and shut the door and he’ll own that.  No ... the tradition of self-sacrifice and fellowship in service for its own sake ... that’s the spirit we’ve to capture and keep.

WEDGECROFT. [Really struck.] A secular Church!

TREBELL. [With reasoning in his tone.] Well ... why not?  Listen here.  In drafting an act of Parliament one must alternately imagine oneself God Almighty and the most ignorant prejudiced little blighter who will be affected by what’s passed.  God says:  Let’s have done with Heaven and Hell ... it’s the Earth that shan’t pass away.  Why not turn all those theology mongers into doctors or schoolmasters?

WEDGECROFT.  As to doctors—­

TREBELL.  Quite so, you naturally prejudiced blighter.  That priestcraft don’t need re-inforcing.

WEDGECROFT.  It needs recognition.

TREBELL.  What!  It’s the only thing most people believe in.  Talk about superstition!  However, there’s more life in you.  Therefore it’s to be schoolmasters.

WEDGECROFT.  How?

TREBELL.  Listen again, young man.  In the youth of the world, when priests were the teachers of men....

WEDGECROFT. [Not to be preached at.] And physicians of men.

TREBELL.  Shut up.

WEDGECROFT.  If there’s any real reform going, I want my profession made into a state department.  I won’t shut up for less.

TREBELL. [Putting this aside with one finger.] I’ll deal with you later.  There’s still Youth in the world in another sense; but the priests haven’t found out the difference yet, so they’re wasting most of their time.

WEDGECROFT.  Religious education won’t do now-a-days.

TREBELL.  What’s Now-a-days?  You’re very dull, Gilbert.

WEDGECROFT.  I’m not duller than the people who will have to understand your scheme.

TREBELL.  They won’t understand it.  I shan’t explain to them that education is religion, and that those who deal in it are priests without any laying on of hands.