The Henson Journals

[251]

11th Sunday after Trinity, August 11th, 1929.

A hot night followed by a wet morning. I celebrated the Holy Communion in St Anne's church, as the Chapel was filled with scaffolding poles. The castle furnished an appreciable contingent to a small congregation of communicants.

Söderblom accompanied me to West Hartlepool where I read the lessons and preached at S. Aidan's. Knowlden was present in church but took no part in the service.

There was a very small congregation, perhaps as many as 60 or 70 persons. The population of the parish exceeds 8000. We returned to Auckland Castle for lunch.

After tea I took my Painter for a walk round the Park. We were amused by the valourous action of Bryden's white cock which resented the approach of Beck, the Labrador, and attacked her with great determination, driving her back successfully, and evidently intimidating her. At intervals the cock enlivened the combat with his triumphant crowing!

[252]

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'That bishop, quite the Winston Churchill of the Church, has nearly boxed the ecclesiastical compass, & now seeks to lead us from the flesh–pots of our Egypt through the wilderness of the ecclesiastical disestablishment into a promised land of freedom.'

Bishop of Truro in Truro Diocesan Gazette for August.

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'The Winston Churchill of the Church' that is my latest description. I have been compared to Lloyd George, to Lord Birkenhead, and to Pius II – all persons whose "brilliance" is supposed to have been divorced from 'character'. The suggestion always is that I am unstable, unscrupulous, ambitious, and insincere.

More discerning persons have compared me with the younger Pitt, not, indeed, designing anything complementary, but only that I too have matured early, & and shown a complete inability to develop! The impression we make on others can never be a matter of indifference to ourselves, nor is it ever without some measure of value in ascertaining the truth.

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