The Henson Journals

[5]

Trinity Sunday, May 30th, 1920.

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Thirty three years of ministry are completed today. How much has passed, how much has changed, how much has failed since too rashly I put my hand to the Plough! Today, I sit in a Bishop's chair, the least trusted & most disliked bishop in the Anglican communion! It is an odd outcome for a whole generation of thought, worry, and effort. There have been immense faults in myself, and grave disadvantages. These can explain much, but not I think all. Had I been more conventional, more ambitious, less eager to be honest, I should not have been either mistrusted or disliked, for then I should have been completely intelligible, but now I appear both cryptic and offensive. Linetta's letter, which I received two days ago, enshrines a very grave censure on my methods even while it expresses a deep agreement with my general attitude, & a warm personal friendship. She has a keen insight, & the power of a curiously subtle ethical analysis. But not the keenest or the kindest of friends can really know what one has been, & what one has attempted, what was the measure of one's failure, and what the degree of one's success. "The heart knoweth its own bitterness: & a stranger doth not intermeddle with the joy thereof." I went to the cathedral at 8 a.m., & received the Holy Communion. There at least one can make one's general confession with the assurance that the Great High Priest will fill in the gaps, and give just weight to the accusations. "O God, there is mercy with Thee: therefore shalt thou be feared." And so I must make my start in the 34th year.

[6]

Ella accompanied me to Ledbury, where I preached in the parish church. My subject was "The Christian Ministry", and my object to raise money for the Diocesan Fund. After service I saw Lord Biddulph, who is now plainly nearing the end of his course. He has a sense of humour, & told me with much amusement how he had received an advertisement from a Crematorium Company, enclosing a long list of persons who had allowed themselves to be cremated, & inviting his patronage!

After lunch I motored to Bullinghope, & dedicated a War–Memorial Cross. Riddell had made his arrangements with much care, & the little service was suitable, dignified, & devotional. The villagers attended in full numbers: & the men who had served in the War stood together in number about 20. Happily the rain held off. After the function we all had tea in the Rectory.

I did not go to Evensong in the Cathedral, but remained in my study and read Bury's "The Idea of Progress, an Inquiry into its origin & growth", a volume which has just issued from the Press. It is, of course, like all his writing, interesting & suggestive. It is, perhaps, less coloured by the violently anti–Christian prejudice which disfigured his small book on "The History of Liberty" in the Home & University Library. Ralph Inge's repeated onslaughts on the common optimism, which takes unlimited progress for granted, have brought the subject of Progress into prominence. It is being debated everywhere just now.

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