The Henson Journals

[24]

Friday, August 30th, 1901.

12 midnight: The hour has just sounded from the church–towers: & I am too staringly awake to continue the pretence of sleep: so I turn up my electric lamp, & seize my tablets. As my holiday now draws to its close, necessarily my conscience proposes the question, What has it done in the service of my duty? Does it send me back to my work better minded to attempt, & better able to perform? Certainly I have an immense desire to do what God requires of me in Westminster: & I pray daily that He may enable me to become what He wills. But is my perception of duty clearer & more constant? Is my will more steadily fixed on its fulfilment? Never before have I had so conspicuous a place to return to after a holiday: with what mind do I return?

My faults & limitations are frightfully evident to me: neither my training nor my experience equips me adequately for my great place. But there I am, & by no action of my own. There I was sent, & there I am required to work.

O Lord Jesus Christ, Whose servant I am though unworthy, have compassion on me, & make me able to do Thy work, & minister to Thy people. Purge my conscience from dead works, & pour into my heart the Spirit of Thine own Pastoral Zeal. Teach me, O Divine Teacher, that I may teach them: bring me in penitence to Thy Feet, that I may bring them. Without Thee, O Master, I must fail in the future as I have failed in the past. Thou, Thou only, art my hope. O cast not out my prayer.

Sculpture

Sergel (1740–1814) 'Amor & Psyche'

O.F. Berg (1839– ) Boy with Apple. 711

Quarnstrom (1810–1867) Neapolitan Fisherboy. 397

Ivory carving – Descent from the Cross. 17th century

Paintings

George v. Rosen. Eric. xiv

Ehrenstrahl (1629–1698). A Negro with monkeys & parrots

Wertmüller. Marie Antoinette

Desportes (1661–1743).

–Rabbits

–Fruit, vegetables, bread, oysters, &c.

Teniers. Young men drinking. 653

Snyders [1579–1657] Two herons & a fox with a bowl containing eels & frogs

L. Cranach.

–A little picture of Luther's mother

–Another of his father

Frank v. Lenbach. Portrait of Döllinger.

The morning was wet, & accordingly I stayed indoors & wrote letters to Watson & Auntie, & then – the weather having improved – went again to the Statues & Pictures, where I noted such as most pleased me. The afternoon we spent in Skansen. The antics of the polar bear, to whom Reichel surrendered his stick, were extraordinarily amusing. We watched the feeding of the wolves & the elks. On the whole, Skansen pleases me more than anything else in Stockholm. Another beautiful sunset, & the most glorious views of the city. The post brought me a very kind letter from Mr Talbot, and another from my sister. Both remind me that for good or for ill, my holiday has nearly reached its end. The fine weather seems to have also ended. It has just begun raining again as I write – 10 p.m.

---