The Henson Journals

[257]

Saturday, April 24th, 1926.

The history of the church ought to be a biography of ideals.

"A religion, as believed and practical, cannot be far in advance of the mental & moral capacity of its adherents. A religion succeeds, not because it is true, but because it suits its worshippers."

"Christ Himself, if He had returned to earth in the Middle Ages, would certainly have been burnt alive for denying the dogma about His own nature."

"Indirectly and in the long run, humanism gained immensely by the Reformation."

"The Paulinism of the Reformation is not a true interpretation of St Paul's Religion."

"My contention is that besides the combative Catholic and Protestant elements in the Churches, there has always been a third element, with very honourable traditions, which came to life again at the Renaissance, but really reaches back to the Greek Fathers, to St Paul and St John, & further back still."

Inge. Hulsean Lectures.

[258]

I read through carefully the report of the Prime Minister's Conference with the mine–owners and the miners. There seems no possibility of bringing them to agreement: and nothing could be more unhelpful than Ramsay Macdonald's [sic] speech on the Deadlock. It is quite evident that everybody is just seeking some party advantage out of the crisis. And meanwhile we of the Church discuss P.B. Revision! Nero's fiddling was by comparison an act of grave and responsible importance! Contrast the nation's genuine concern for the Coal–settlement, with its total unconcern for every religious question!

In the afternoon Campbell motored me to his country cottage about 20 miles distant from Brighton, a delectable retreat 800 feet above the sea, set out on a great waste of golden–blooming furze, known as Ashdown Forest. We had much conversation going and coming. He spoke much of his experiences as a nonconformist, & of the leading nonconformist ministers. Selbie now wields in the University of Oxford & over the students of Mansfield College, a larger influence than that formerly possessed by Fairbairn. F.D.Mayer is now a fundamentalist and inclined to Millenarianism. Horton is partially humanized by his young wife!

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