The Henson Journals

[126]

Thursday, July 5th, 1928.

I drove to the Athenaeum, & there revised my notes for the "pronouncements" I am pledged to make at Westminster this afternoon. The Confirmation in the Abbey Church was at 12 noon. I confirmed 47 boys, & gave them an address on Acts xi.26. They were very attentive, and everything seemed reverent and significant. After the service I lunched with the Head–master & Mrs Costley–White. Lord Muir–Mackenzie was there, looking very aged & infirm. At 3.15 p.m. there was a meeting of the Parents National Education Association presided over by the Marchioness of Aberdeen in the Big School. I "talked large" for more than half an hour, & then went in to the Assembly for the close of the day's proceedings. Then I walked with Headlam to Lambeth to attend the Garden Party, which was very numerously attended. I left Ella there, & went to the Athenaeum, where I dined with the suffragans of Barrow & Jarrow. I felt exceedingly tired, & soon returned to Park Lane to go to bed.

Ella 'returned to the charge' about the writing–table which she wants to buy for herself for £12: and, of course, she got her way: but it is an expenditure equally untimely and unnecessary.

[127] [symbol]

The 'British Weekly' has a very flatterous notice of the Archbishop's statement to the Assembly, and affects to question the expediency of his Grace's resignation. Why should he not himself preside over the Committee of Statesmen & divines which he indicated as requisite for the reconsideration of the existing relations of Church & State? The anxiety displayed by the Nonconformists to prevent the raising of Disestablishment is very remarkable, & very suggestive. How ought it to be interpreted?

I incline to think that the proposal to raise a National Testimonial to the Archbishop and Mrs Davidson is mistaken. After all, his Grace will retire on a pension of £1500 per annum, which is sufficient for the modest needs of an octogenarian, and will be generally so regarded. He has no family, for which to make provision. If a testimonial of national regard were all that is intended, & it is not easy to see that more is required, an Address might suffice, or – but this would more fitly follow his death – a statue might be erected: but why organize an appeal for contributions throughout England for a large monetary gift? Moreover, I doubt whether, in spite of the adulation ^and advertisement^, there will be any considerable response.