Krishnamurti is not a Christian, but he recognizes like all truly religious and spiritual people that the heart of religion is freedom of choice and being oneself, rather than the false person others want one to be. Like Smith, Krishnamurti also understands that love is the essence of the religious life and not being forced to conform:
The mind that loves is really a religious mind because it is the movement of reality, of truth, of God. . . . The mind that is not caught in any philosophy, that is not enclosed in any system or belief, hat is, not driven by its own ambition and is therefore sensitive, alert, watchful--such a mind has beauty (Krishnamurti 187).
Hughes feels none of these--not beauty, not truth, not freedom, not love. Instead, he feels the ugliness of his community as it forces him to do something which is no
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