It is untrue that fiction is nonutilitarian. The uses of fiction are synonymous with the uses of literature. They include refreshment, clarification of life, self-awareness, expansion of our range of experiences, and enlargement of our sense of understanding and discovery, perception, intensification, expression, beauty , and understanding. Like literature generally, fiction is a form of discovery, perception, intensification, expression, beauty, and understanding. If it is all these things, the question of whether it is a legitimate use of time should not even arise.

The Bible is obviously a mixed book. Literary and nonliterary (expository, explanatory) writing exist side by side within the covers of this unique book.

The Puritans removed organs and paintings from churches, but bought them for private use in their homes.

Stressing the God-centered life can lead to an otherworldly withdrawal from everyday earthly life.

Since God is the one who calls people to their work, the worker becomes a steward who serves God.

The secularization of Western culture was accompanied by the elevation of art to the position of a substitute religion to replace Christianity.

Literature incarnates its meanings as concretely as possible. The knowledge that literature gives of a subject is the kind of knowledge that is obtained by (vicariously) living through an experience.