In Secret Gardens, Humphrey Carpenter writes that “the Christian Socialists, whose doctrinal liberalism was combined with some rather vague attempts at social reform, played no small part in the creation of more than one of the outstanding children's books that were about to appear” (6). Carpenter is referring primarily to Thomas Hughes's Tom Brown's Schooldays (1857) and Charles Kingsley's The Water Babies (1863). No less an authority on the Victorian age, Richard Altick claims of the Christian Socialists: “Like their inspirer, Coleridge, they were convinced that the Church had an obligation to initiate and guide social action, even so far as to defend the workers against capitalistic exploitation” (142). With Kingsley's reforming zeal and Hughes's rough-and-tumble, black-eyed spirituality, this brand of Christian Socialism was dubbed “muscular Christianity,” a virile, strong-armed Christianity, a man's religion, so to speak, that melded courage and faith, spirit and body. Though Kingsley himself dismissed the term “muscular Christianity,” Carpenter posits that these men “actually … seem to have been rather flattered by it” (31).

A central figure in the Christian Socialist movement was F. D. Maurice, a friend of and influence on Kingsley, Hughes, and William Morris. Maurice felt universality was fundamental to Christianity: people should exist in cooperation, in a universal community centered on God.