The Henson Journals

[111]

Monday, March 24th, 1919.

'Writers are apt to flatter themselves that they are not, like the men of action, the slaves of circumstance. They think they can write what and when they choose. But it is not so. Whatever we may think and scheme, as soon as we seek to produce our thoughts or schemes to our fellow–men, we are involved in the same necessities of compromise, the same grooves of motion, the same liabilities to failure or half–measures as we are in life and action. Compared with the vast designs we frame in youth, all production seems a petty and abortive effort.'

Mark Pattison. "Casaubon" p. 383.

I spent the morning in my study working mostly on the sermon for Jimmie Adderley. In the afternoon I sawed wood, prepared notes for an address tonight & did my letters with Wynne–Willson. After an early dinner I went to All Saints, and there instituted Treherne's successor, Rushton. There was a fair congregation, and a good muster of the clergy. After the Institution, the Archdeacon performed the Induction. The latter function has been developed into a far more elaborate ceremonial than the former! Wynne–Willson carried the pastoral staff. It was a fairly satisfactory service.

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