The Henson Journals

[125]

Monday, July 30th, 1917.

1092nd day

"Ideals must speedily wither if they are consciously realized to be but the cloudland of fancy; to a true idealism they are an intense vision of the foundations on which the universe is built."

This is a suggestive definition indeed. Pringle Pattison draws an inference later:–

"Hence the ideal is precisely the most real thing in the world: and those ranges of our experience, such as religion, which are specifically concerned with the ideal, instead of being treated as a cloud–cuckoo–land of subjective fancy, may reasonably be accepted as the best interpreters we have of the true nature of reality" (p. 251–2).

I read the Gifford Lectures for an hour before breakfast. Just before Mattins, a knock at my door revealed Edgar Dobbie who came to thank me for my kindness to him. Probably his parents had enjoined this upon him as a duty. I attended Mattins: & then spent the morning in making selections from the Warden's Journal. I attended Evensong, took Logic for a walk, & resumed work on the Journal until dinner. Then I wrote to Ella, Gilbert, and Linetta.

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