The Henson Journals

[554]

Monday, June 19th, 1916.

686th day

I read through the Report of the National Birth–rate Commission. Some things surprised me, e.g. that clergymen & ministers should be included among "occupations in which fertility is significantly less than the general mean". One's own observation corresponds with the general belief that the families of clergymen are commonly large. Probably the statistics are affected by the increasing number of celibates. The Report holds that "conscious limitation of fertility is widely practised among the middle & upper classes", and that "there is no reason to believe that the higher education of women (whatever its indirect results upon the birth rate may be) has any important effect in diminishing their physiological aptitude to bear children". But those "indirect results" are certainly considerable, & may well be decisive. The Report includes the following clear & sound statement:

"The prevention of conception and the destruction of the concept are fundamentally distinct, medically, medico–legally, and ethically, and the Commission cannot attach serious importance to pronouncements, from whatever source, which perceive no such distinction."

It also states:

"Among conscientious high–minded laymen women in the Anglican Church there are many who openly justify the use of preventives, this attitude has become far more common during the last few years".

This is a grave pronouncement, implies much.

The Report perceives one formidable danger:

"We cannot close our eyes to the fact that the more widely spread knowledge of the means of preventing conception by the unmarried not only involves the removal of the prudential restraint on licence in sexual relations, but may affect the birth–rate in the future in two ways" (1) by encouraging the avoidance of marriage: (2) by carrying into marriage a practice already begun.

[552]

I attended Evensong, and then took Hughes for a walk. He tells me that Lillingston preached in the market–place last night, and that 'twas the veriest tub–thumping. He does not appear to me to have any notion of evangelisation beyond such tub–thumping: I doubt whether the mission is likely to work out into anything else. The afternoon post brought a long affectionate letter from Ernest. He writes well and in a good spirit.

"The last view we took of the Cathedral with its towers peering up out of the darkness of the night and made visible by the subdued light of the cloud–veiled moon on the right, is a scene I shall long remember. There is a certain sadness about those massive towers which tell with much eloquence the stories of days that are gone, which tell of days when strong men possessed that faith of a little child, by almost superhuman effort attempted to reflect something of the Glory of God on earth."

The influence of his frequent affectionate study of Dickens is perhaps apparent in his composition: his passion for Shakespeare gives a certain dignity to his writing. Anyway, it promises well for his sermons presently. May God keep him from sin, and strengthen him in good purpose! I started extracting from the Churchwardens' Accounts of St. Margaret's, Westminster (of which the transcripts are in my possession) such passages as illustrated the actual process of the Reformation in that important church. It occurred to me that I might disclose the facts most effectively in a specific example. What could the Reformation have meant to the parishioners who witnessed such things?

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