The Henson Journals
Sat 8 November 1913
Volume 19, Pages 49 to 52
[49]
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Saturday, November 8th, 1913. Canterbury.
"So teach me to number my days that I may apply my heart to wisdom."
Today I complete half a century of a lifetime.
There can be few undisclosed possibilities so far as I am concerned, & few illusions. Fifty years must suffice to give any man the measure of his own powers, and set the limit to his personal ambitions. The mere passage of time settles many things. At fifty one is practically at the end of one's learning technical things. The type of one's knowledge is fixed. One may add to what one has, but the additions will be balanced by what one forgets. At fifty one is at the end of forming convictions. Some changes of emphasis may happen, but hardly any change of belief. Is there any instance of a heretick becoming such after fifty? Moral crises may happen at any age, but they grow less probable as the years pass. Most of the dramatic conversions belong to an earlier phase of life. The grooves of one's effort have been found & fixed at fifty. There is little prospect, or probability, or promise of breaking new ground. One's contemporaries have made up their minds, & though they may yet "give to him that hath" they will assuredly 'take away from him that hath not' even that persistent hope which is the only thing that he hath.
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Today, then, I must needs 'take stock' of my position. And try to estimate the outcome of fifty years. So far as 'professional success' is concerned, I must not complain. Of my contemporaries who took Orders, two only – Lang & Ingram – have gone farther. The Abpk of York & the Bpk of London are greater places than the Deanery of Durham, but most of the bishopricks are inferior in importance. Far more important than the official place is the personal position which has been gained. This, of course, is extraordinarily difficult to measure. Probably the general opinion would allow me a certain eminence among preachers, & would recognize in me an unique independence. I think I have come through the stage of being discounted as a wayward crank, & am now 'taken seriously' even by opponents. Perhaps the disposition now is to overrate me, & my powers. Certainly I am now often discovering the gravity of my limitations as well of ability & aptitude as of knowledge & experience. Much is assumed to be easily within my range, which really lies beyond it: & much that I do is only done at an expenditure of labour which is out of all proportion to its difficulty or importance. Accordingly I am increasingly embarrassed by the excessive estimate of my competence which is often disclosed, & often half–tempted to make a public confession of abject & utter ignorance!
[51] [symbol]
By a coincidence which is not quite without significance I have to decide what answer I shall return to Robinson's letter, which reached me yesterday, proposing formally that I should undertake to write a weekly leader, summing up the situation, & giving a general indication of national policy. The arguments for and against acceptance seem to be nicely balanced, so that it is hard to come to a decision.
After the example of the great Lord Burleigh, I will set down the pros & cons of the matter:–
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All this assumes that I can do this kind of work, an assumption which is not obviously safe, & may be quite unsound.
[52]
My kind hosts presented me with a copy of Stanley's "Memorials of Canterbury", a book charming in itself which I shall henceforward regard with affection. Mary & Linetta sent me a telegram of congratulation. The choristers of Durham also sent me a telegram. In the course of the journey I contracted a chill, which grew heavier upon me until I was driven to go to bed, absenting myself from the dinner party which mine hosts had arranged. This was truly a dolourous mode of celebrating my jubilee.