The Henson Journals

[129]

9th Sunday after Trinity, August 5th, 1917.

1098th day

Laud's prayers give the impression of great conscientiousness. They are self–centred because he, as much as Milton, knew himself to be always under "the Great Taskmaster's eye", and his conception of his duty, mistaken as in some mistakes it was, did yet bring a very coercive & continuing sense of personal obligation. Thus he prays:–

"O Lord, I beseech Thee, make me to remember how much more than other men I have need to call upon Thee. My charge is great, and my strength little; O give me grace to come often before Thee, and ask that help, which Thou art readier to give than I to ask; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen"

There is a feeling of great emptiness in the air as if Durham were deserted. This feeling may but exhale from the fact, as perhaps, feeling generally does. At the early Celebration there were very few communicants. Among them was George and one of the Abbey boys. Also two young soldiers, & the usher of the Choir School. The weather is warm and sunless, but there is a "fine" feeling in the air, as if it might develop into brightness.

A letter from Gamble discloses a troubled state of mind. He limits our legitimate conditions of peace negotiations to "the evacuation of Belgium & the French territory, with compensation for wrong done" but "would not shed a drop of English blood to recover Alsace–Lorraine". He ignores Serbia, Poland and Armenia wholly and takes no account of the new issues raised by the submarine campaign, by the slave–raids in Belgium & France, by the re–iterated assertion of the principle of nationality & its bearing on the organization of the Balkans. Inge has a letter in the "Nation" much in the same strain, ignoring the situation which the War has created & striving to simplify the issue into its original form. This seems to me in both cases mainly due to a dislike of the "democratic" cant which has flowed so freely since Russia went into Revolution, & to a disturbance of the imagination caused by the gigantic slaughter & destructiveness of the War.

[130]

The congregation at Mattins was distressingly small, a circumstance the more regrettable since Knowling preached an admirably suitable little sermon from the words of St Peter: "Casting all your anxiety on Him, for He careth for you".

The special service to mark the 3rd anniversary of the War was favoured with good weather, and was attended by a more considerable congregation than I had ventured to expect. I received the mayor "with his tails on" at the north western door, whereto he had come together with the High Sheriff. The latter I escorted to the Chancel and placed him in a stall as "the King's representative". My sermon was very closely listened to, and made, I hope, a useful impression. The text was "No man having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God". At the close of the service the National Anthem was sung with much fervour. In the congregation I observed Colonel Burdon & his wife, looked much harrowed by their distress for their son's death. The High Sheriff (Cyril Liddell), Col. & Mrs Darwin, Major & Mrs Low, Col. & Mrs Blackett, Capt. & Mrs Duff, Pemberton and Betty, the Precentor & his wife, and Hughes came to tea after the service. I was pleased to see Loxley, the Vicar of St Oswald's, in the congregation, & in the Choir the two ex–choristers, George & Walter Jackson.

This will, I pray God from my heart, be the last of these "War Services" until we have a great Thanksgiving for Victory bringing back to the world Peace. There can be no doubt that the prolongation of the War is tending to the discredit of Christianity, for not only is the strain of the gross paradox of Christian warfare intensified, but also the difficulty of resisting the fierce passions which war generates & stimulates is so greatly increased that even the best–disposed men find it well–nigh impossible not to give place to what they know is anti–Christian. "The quest is not for me" – that is the feeling of our best people with respect to Christianity: the worse folk have a secret joy in the confirmation of their secret hope that Christianity may after all be but one more delusion, a last and crowning fraud.

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