The Henson Journals

[44]

Thursday, December 14th, 1922.

I read Aquinas on Marriage. He is very interesting, very acute, & sometimes uncommonly absurd. It is evident enough that he influences the religious public far beyond the range of his acknowledged authority . After lunch I motored to Darlington, and met the Archbishop of York. We motored to Stockton–on–Tees, where we attended a meeting organized by the League of Nations Union in the Empire Theatre. The building was well filled, that is, the company numbered more than 2000 people. Sir Frank Brown was in the chair. The Archbishop spoke for an hour. He was not as effective as I had expected, though it was a good speech. I made a short speech, and pronounced the Benediction. After the meeting we had tea with Sir Frank Brown, & then returned to Auckland Castle. Miss Headlam arrived to dine and sleep. D. Braunholy came to dinner. After everybody had gone to bed, Lang and I had some conversation. He professes to be largely in agreement with me on the Marriage question: at least he is prepared to agree to some kind of conference on the subject . I pointed out that no good result could reasonably be expected of any conference of which the members did not possess genuinely open minds. It would be futile to bring together men who had made up their minds that they were not free to admit the dissolubility of marriage for any reason whatever. He professed agreement with me. The "Times" prints my letter.

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