The Henson Journals

[339]

Wednesday, June 9th, 1926.

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In replying to the Archbishop's letter I must point out the difficulties in which diocesan bishops are placed by these pronouncements from Lambeth, which cannot but be invested with authority, and respecting which they have had no opportunity of expressing their mind. In this particular instance, the normal difficulty was greatly increased by the gravity of the issue at stake. I must point out the unfortunate blunder of allowing Cardinal Bourne to become the mouth–piece of national sentiment & civic duty, a role which belongs pre–eminently to the National Church, & therein conspicuously to the Primate. On the practical mischiefs which have followed, & will follow, his Grace's action I must emphasize the impetus which it has given to the tendency, already far too strong, among the parochial incumbents, to substitute "Labour politics" for Christianity: and to obscure the essential gravity of the General Strike in the mind of the artisans. It is horrid to find one's self driven to affirm so complete a dissent from one, whose magnanimity and goodness are so apparent, but there is no avoiding it. Ever since the Archbishop gave in to "Life and Liberty", and assisted to carry the Enabling Act, he has not been his own master, & now he simply cannot extricate himself.

[340] [symbol]

I finished reading through Burke's "Thoughts on the Cause of the Present Discontents". Although it was written as long ago as 1770, it is extraordinarily relevant to the situation in 1926. Here is a description of the "Labour" leaders:

A species of men to whom a state of order would become a sentence of obscurity are nourished into a dangerous magnitude by the heat of intestine disturbances: and it is no wonder that, by a sort of sinister piety, they cherish, in their turn, the disorders which are the parents of all their consequence.

Elsewhere he speaks of "those numberless impostors who had deluded the ignorant with professions incompatible with human practice, and have afterwards incensed them by practices below the level of vulgar rectitude."

Burke's declaration that "all virtue which is impracticable is spurious" is true, but its precise application to human conduct is rendered precarious by the circumstance that the judgment as to what is, or is not, impracticable is neither inspired nor unprejudiced. To hold a middle course between a visionary idealism and a low–toned expediency is not easy. Perhaps it would be true to say that experience delivers a severer verdict on the first than on the last. On the whole, the fanatic has been more disastrous to mankind than the opportunist.

[341]

I spent two hours in the garden during the afternoon, protecting myself against the wind with a screen.

I wrote to the Bishop of Hereford promising to preach in his Cathedral on July 30th, when the 1250th anniversary of the founding of the Hereford Bishoprick, which had to be postponed on account of the General Strike, is to be commemorated. May we dare to hope that the Coal Strike will have ended by that time? Nothing could be more hopeless than the outlook which the newspapers describe this morning. It becomes difficult to believe that Cook & Smith are free agents. Have they given any kind of pledge to their Russian paymasters? Meanwhile the squalid conflict within the Liberal Party runs its course. It seems certain that the tiny group in Parliament will split into two sections, led severally by Lloyd George and Simon.

The better part of the Liberal electorate will no doubt follow the example of Sir Alfred Mond & Hilton Young, i.e. will join the Unionists. The worse part, which probably forms three fourth's of the whole, will join "Labour". About 4,000,000 votes were cast for Liberal candidates at the last election, against 5 1/2 millions for "Labour", and 7,000,000 for the Conservatives: more than 4,000,000 voters never went to the poll. If these proportions remain unchanged, the next election would show 8,000,000 Conservatives to about 8,500,000 Labourites. An evil prospect.

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