The Henson Journals

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Thursday, November 14th, 1912. Cambridge, Mass.

There was a thunderstorm during the night, & the morning is very wet. I conducted prayers as usual, taking for the subject of my little preachment 'The futility of mere profession apart from appropriate practice,’ & for my text S. Matt. VII. 21.

I had three visitors at Wadsworth House – a congregationalist minister, an undergraduate, & a negro clergyman. The undergraduate, Mr Wolcott Cutler, was a pleasant fair lad of 21, who was debating the question whether he should, or should not, take Orders. The negro had been originally a Moravian, but had changed his church when he no longer found his opinions agreeable to the Moravian authorities! He said the coloured people were little affected by Episcopalianism, which was too formal for them. The Baptists appealed to them most. They were attracted by the public immersion. Christianity, he thought, had little hold on Americans. Even the Episcopal clergy seemed to him by comparison with the English clergy very little religious. "You can see it in their faces. There is a look in an English clergyman's face which you never see in an American's. Phillips Brooks had it, but he was quite exceptional". This statement interested me, & set me wondering what amount of truth there might be in it, & what might be the real explanation of the fact thus described. The darkie described the coloured students in Harvard as frankly without religion.

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Appleton Lawrance fetched me about 1.pm. to lunch in his club, a very comfortably arranged establishment, which had once been affiliated to the "Alpha Delta Phi" society, but had cut itself adrift therefrom, because – if I gathered the cause correctly – it rather resented the socially–crude persons who claimed kindred by title of the larger membership! We lunched off the largest plates I have eaten from. Then we went to the office of the Harvard "Lampoon" a comic journal wholly conducted by the students. It is housed on a fantastically shaped but exceedingly well arranged building set out in the middle of the street. The medieval hall at the top of the building is an excellent replica of a medieval drinking room. In one of the windows was a piece of 13th century glass, said to have been brought from the monastery of St Augustine, Canterbury, and presented to the "Lampoon" by some contributor. Next, we went to the house of the "Hasty Pudding Club", which is the dramatic centre of the University. Here is a small theatre in which are acted plays written by the men themselves. Finally, we inspected the dormitories, where the men are housed. These impressed me as distinctly more luxurious than the rooms provided for undergraduates in our Colleges. I inquired what control was exercised by the University over these buildings, & I was told [206] [symbol] that the only check on disorder was the presence of a student, known as 'the proctor’, who was responsible for reporting any misconduct to the University. These lodgings do not appear to belong to the University, but to be private ventures carried on by arrangement with the University.

Later in the afternoon I was entertained at tea by the students of the Episcopal Seminary, and sat for nearly two hours in a heated & smoke–laden atmosphere talking to the youth. On the whole they impressed me well. One of them brought me a copy of "The Liberty of Prophesying", & begged me to write my autograph in it. We talked much about the European Situation: the scandalous proceedings in the House of Commons last night, which are reported at some length in the American papers: & the social question. The Socialist youth was again to the fore, but it seemed to me that he was rather more subdued than on the first occasion. Then I attended evensong in the Chapel.

There was a dinner party. The Dean & Mrs Hodges, Mr & Mrs King, & Mr & Mrs Sutor made up the party. Our conversation was animated, entertaining, & well sustained but left me no clear recollection on my mind sufficiently coherent & interesting to provide matter for record in this journal.

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