The Henson Journals

[180]

Tuesday, September 23rd, 1919.

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I worked at the Anson Memoir. Knight came to lunch, and afterwards I motored him back to Bridstow. We had much conversation about the state of affairs in the Church. He says that Zanzibar has been writing letters to the Times conceived in a very fanatical tone, & he has passed one of these for publication. On the whole we stand to gain by the dispersion as widely as possible of his fulminations. I was pleased to see that Knight and his wife are evidently pleased with their new home, and settling down there happily. He continues to write a good deal for the "Times"; and finds that, by means of a telephone in his house, he can communicate easily and speedily with London.

The Bishop of Bombay communicates a long letter to the "Pulpit Exchange" discussion. He disapproves of course, but has some fantastic scheme of his own which seems to come to much the same thing. The strange fondness for splitting hairs which marks the Pharisees, new & old, is one of the least alluring features of their sect. But I prefer the old persecuting bigot to the modern type of sinuous & soft–spoken fanatick, who conceals his bigotry from himself by a plenitude of fraternal language. Old Canon Wilson's letter yesterday was unfortunate rather than hostile, untimely rather than mischievous. He grows old.

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