The Henson Journals

[124]

Saturday, January 12th, 1924.

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Is not the whole sum of the matter this, that orthodoxy as a principle of action or a standard of belief is obsolete and dead? It is not that the substance of orthodoxy has been altered, but that the very principle of orthodoxy has been essentially disowned. It is not conceivable now that any council, however ecumenically constituted, should so pronounce on truth that its decrees should have any weight with thinking men, save what might seem legitimately to belong to the character and wisdom of the persons who composed the council. Personal judgement is on the throne, and will remain there, – personal judgement, enlightened by all the wisdom, past or present, which it can summon to its aid, but forming finally its own conclusions and standing by them in the sight of God, whether it stands in a great company or stands alone.

Phillips Brooks. 1890 (v. Life ii. 751)

A sudden thaw and rain during the night had nearly cleaned away the snow. I prepared a sermon for tomorrow: walked with Ernest & the dogs in the Park: wrote to George Nimmins at his address in Java: read the papers, and so squandered another day.

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