The Henson Journals

[108]

3rd Sunday after Trinity, June 28th, 1925.

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O God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, look with pity on my miserable failures even to accomplish the works to which I put my hand. Thou knowest whereof we are made. Thou rememberest that we are but dust. Have compassion on Thy Church and preserve it from our blindness and sin. Suffer me not to fall into error and transgression, but guide my course, & strengthen me in my way.

Fulfil Thy promise of the Holy Spirit's help, and make me able to do Thy Will, through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen

The Provost of Oriel sent me a note asking me to propose the College at the Gaudy on Thursday! Oriel and the Oxford Movement are synonyms. How can I refer without giving offence to that greatest hour of the Collegiate history? There is, of course, the earlier movement of the Noetics. Whately may counterbalance Newman. Oriel provided both the poison and the antidote. I may leave the allocation of the descriptions to my hearers. Then, of course, there is Cecil Rhodes, whose rather aggressive figure adorns the new buildings where they face the High: and there is the War, with its great sacrifice of young men, and, finally, the modern world which the War has bequeathed to us in which the rôle of the Universities must be more ever important, & in Oxford, the University really means the College.

[109]

I preached in the Abbey church at the morning service. The Lord Mayor and his company attended as it was Hospital Sunday. My sermon, on the subject "Christianity and Medical Science", was the substance of a chapter in my book on "Spiritual Healing". There was a very large congregation, and it was very attentive to my discourse which (as a clock in the pulpit certified) occupied 26 minutes in delivery. Buff (Mr Galbraith) was there with a friend, and also Sir Charles Ballance. I shook hands with Sir H. Craik, and divers ladies, who belonged to St Margaret's in the old time. The Dean sent in a message that he would like to see me after the service; so I went to the Deanery, & had a quarter of an hour with him. He is weak and drowsy. The doctors say (so Charles told us) that he couldn't hold out more than 2 months. Donaldson, the Socialist Canon, came to see me. He wanted to press on me the claims of Gobat for preferment! I pointed out that Anglo–Catholicism + Socialism was not acceptable in most parishes; & that Gobat's preferment was arrested by the difficulty of finding a place where his opinions & methods would be welcomed.

Sir Charles Ballance fetched me at 4p.m. and carried me to 106 Harley Street where I celebrated the Holy Communion in his wife's bedroom. Besides the sick lady & her husband there communicated her son and two daughters. Then I walked back to Dean's Yard, (i.e. I motored to the Athenaeum, and hence walked), and attended the service in the Abbey. The Bishop of Norwich preached, & there was a pompous procession.

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