The Henson Journals

[181]

Wednesday, March 8th, 1922.

My dear Ralph,

Thank you so much for your letter. How I wish you were on the Bench just now. It is just for these – the highest policies of the hierarchy – that your mind would be invaluable.

I don't think there is any chance of the Bishops agreeing to anything so strong and lucid and true as what you have written: they would say that the broad effect of such a pronouncement would be to encourage such proceedings as the Cambridge Conference, and correspondingly to depress the "Faithful". Whereas they would describe their purpose almost in the reverse order. They want to discourage essays in modernism, and to re–assure "the Faithful". Personally I won't sign anything which doesn't at least indicate a perception of the need for re–casting the traditional theology, and an approval of sound essays thereunto.

I am indeed grieved to hear that your anxieties for dear little Paula have been renewed. May the relapse be temporary, and followed by a steady recovery of health! You & Kitty are much in my mind.

Yours v. affectley

Herbert Dunelm:

I wrote to the Bishop of Bristol invoking his assistance in my project for creating Professorships.

The voting for the County Council results here in Bishop Auckland in the return of Mr Morgan, and the defeat of Sam: Adams, the sitting member. Both were, I understand, "Moderates". The "Labour" candidate polled but a few votes.

Ella and I lunched at the Vicarage with Lady Thurlow & the twins, whose birthday is tomorrow. I gave them each a volume of Henty.

After lunch Ella, Clayton, & I motored to Sedgefield, & there I confirmed 69 candidates in the parish church. Afterwards we had tea in the Rectory. Sedgefield Church is dedicated to S. Edmund Rich, and contained an altar of S. Thomas of Canterbury. These are unusual dedications anywhere, & peculiarly interesting in the diocese of Durham.

[182] [symbol]

Lord Lee of Fareham was entertained last night by the English–speaking Union. He began his speech with some allusions to American Prohibition.

"I have only this to say about it – that in the course of, I believe, 68 dinners which my wife and I had the privilege of attending in Washington during our visit I think it was in only five that it was in any sense conspicuous that there had been a cataclysmic revolution in the social habits of the American People. At the same time, if it is true, & I can scarcely believe it to be, that a distinguished fellow–countryman of ours has expressed the opinion in America that – to put it bluntly – drunkenness is prevalent among the young people of both sexes, all I can say is that that statement from my own observation, & very close observation, extending over 20 years, is as ludicrous as it is cruel & untrue."

I suppose the "distinguished fellow–countryman" is Mr Asquith, & the statement in question is certainly absurdly exaggerated, but Lord Lee's statement about the free consumption of alcohol in the banquets in Washington (for that is what it amounts to) is a striking testimony to the failure of Prohibition. So great is the difficulty of getting hold of the truth about the actual working of Prohibition, that this statement of a competent witness is worth noting. That he should have felt himself free to make it publicly is a circumstance not without a certain importance.

Balfour's speech last night contained a notable tribute to the Prime Minister:

"He may be liked or disliked by this or that foreign statesman, or for the matter of that by this or that domestic critic: but that his name will stand out as one of the greatest figures of one of the greatest periods of the world's history I have not the slightest doubt."

That Lloyd George could be spoken of in those terms by Arthur Balfour is a fact which may well give pause to those who allow themselves to revile him as a kind of political gutter snipe.

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