The Henson Journals

[130]

Monday, January 24th, 1921.

"Mihi autem videtur acerba semper et immatura mors eorum, qui immortale aliquid parant. Nam, qui voluptatibus dediti quasi in diem vivunt, vivendi causas cotidie finiunt: qui vero posteros cogitant et memoriam sui operibus extendunt, his nulla mors non repentina est, ut quoe semper inchoatum aliguid abrumpat." Pliny V.5

"To me, indeed, the death of men who are engaged upon some immortal achievement always seems harsh and sudden. For those who are abandoned to their pleasures, since they live for the day, accomplish day by day the whole purpose of their lives: but those who take thought for posterity and prolong their memories by their works, to them no death is other than sudden since it always breaks off some unfinished design."

Compare this with the words of St John: "The world passeth away and the lust thereof, but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever." Yet Christ is said to have urged the approach of death as a reason for activity: "The night cometh when no man can work". It is bravely said that "we are all immortal till our work is done", but, perhaps, Pliny's attitude comes most naturally to the mind, as the truest to the facts of experience. There is a baffling element of enigma in life.

[131] [symbol]

I made a final revision of my sermons for next Sunday: went through the correspondence with Clayton: wrote divers letters on my own account: & finally took my departure for York by the 5.12 p.m. express. In the railway carriage was a communicative gentleman, who said he had often stayed at Auckland as a friend of the late Bishop, and who spoke with intelligence & knowledge of the situation in Turkey. I asked his name. It was Onslow. I put up at the Station Hotel. Old Canon Scott was there: we dined together. He was full of Manchester gossip. His antipathy to the outgoing bishop is the measure of his enthusiasm over Temple's appointment. He says that Knox is taking a pension of £1400 per annum: & that there is no small resentment in the diocese. The outgoing Dean, now Bishop of Lincoln, is, he assures me, detested in Manchester & the present dean, a pleasant but brainless Irishman is accordingly welcomed. He desired to seize the opportunity provided by Temple's enthronement to introduce copes into the cathedral, but was over–ruled by the chapter which followed the more sagacious course recommended by Canon Scott. We gossiped of persons & policies. "I hope to live to see you Archbishop of Canterbury", he said. And I scoffed at the idea. All the tendencies of the time are hostile to what I believe, & to what I desire.

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