No flue yet. I feel like the psalmist, with 10,000 falling beside me but it shall not come nigh me,217 perhaps because of inoculation, perhaps because of my righteousness. With you, it must be righteousness. Do keep it up! Constance Babington Smith says we must both be stronger after Pleshey;218 she is a nice mixture of great simplicity and real ability. Her air-photography book219 is being serialised in the Sunday Times (some of it) thro’ December. She is a great dear, and radiantly happy about her book promising so much success.... I hope she won’t have her head a little turned by fame & money.
I thought Canon Warren Hunt220 wrong about Lazarus not having improved at all after death. He showed real unselfish concern for his brothers, and might in the end develop a wider pity and generosity. ‘As we die, so we stay’ seemed to be Canon Hunt’s belief.
V. much love.
E.R.M.
Guy Fawkes [5 November,] 1957
Dearest Jeanie,
... Do you remember your minute of silence each morning at II. O for Little Lemon?221 I’m afraid the Russians have quite done for themselves with the English now. They tell us reassuringly how comfortable Little Lemon is, and how he’ll soon be shot out, won’t become a satellite on his own (I should like him to fly round the earth yelping) but will be parachuted gently to earth and picked up. But this morning a Soviet scientist blundered, and said something about ‘if the dog is still alive then’, so obviously they know he’ll die soon.
If they’d any sense, or wanted to please us, they would have called him a rat or guinea-pig, then only a few children with guinea-pigs would have minded. Dear me, how clever they are! The next thing will be the moon, and quite soon. Perhaps they’ll send Zhukov there. Would you volunteer, if you were offered £10,000 for missions? Would you think it right to?…
The Folk Mass was quite attractive, I thought. I drove down Fr Derry and Fr Jeffery (whom you talked to, and who is going back to Grace Dieu)222 and Gerard Irvine’s brother, a clever young barrister who attends the Annunciation Church [Bryanston Street] and is amusing company. We had an enjoyable evening; tho’ Fr Derry, who is musical, doesn’t think the music very good, nor do most musical people, but it suits me quite well. Fr Jeffery said no use for Africans, who prefer hot Jazz and rhythm, like many young people here. Myself I prefer neither really, but something more classical. However, this is worth trying.
I went on Sunday to the All Saints’ [Margaret Street] patronal festival mass, with the Bp of Tewkesbury preaching and a fine procession, the Bishop blessing us to right & left all round the church and people falling on their knees as he passed. The church was packed out, with lots standing. Then in the evening I went to mass at the Weigh House, where Dr John Huxtable preached a magnificent sermon, great waste really, with only about a dozen people there. He was most impressive, about the Table prepared for us in the presence of our enemies (Ps. 23) who prowled in the background waiting their time to get us again and sneering ‘I shall get you in the end.’ My blood ran cold, he was so dramatic. I wonder if Congregationalists are dwindling; so very few people go there. After the sermon and prayers they had the communion, Dr Huxtable consecrated the bread and wine, and a lay helper took them round to us in our seats. As I had been [to an] early [celebration], I couldn’t practise intercommunion this time. Before the service the minister said it was free to all denominations.
Fr Harris... is worrying in the November Parish Mag. why more don’t come to Sunday evensong, and what he can do to entice us. Jock Henderson used to have discussion meetings after church at the vicarage, which people liked; I went to several, but the level of intelligence seemed rather too low for a sensible discussion of the book we were reading. However, it was popular, if rather dumb. I doubt if Fr H. would have this, discussion not being in his line, but he contemplates a social gathering sometimes. I would like a discussion of the sermon, as I have often told him. People would have lots to say about that, I think, even the less intelligent of us. I wish he would try it. I would like him to cheer up and not feel discouraged about his congregations. All the same, I can’t often go to evening church, I am too busy, and rely on Sundays to get some work done without interruption. This Sunday I had to finish reviewing the Life of Jowett, a most interesting work, for The Spectator, and get thro’ a great many letters. Work first, worship later if time, I think must be my rule. You might like to read Jowett’s Life; the part about Essays and Reviews (1860) and the extraordinary excitement and hostility against it, and the heresy prosecutions for statements we all accept today, makes very interesting reading.223 I suppose in another 100 years things that shock orthodox Christians today will all be accepted except by a few die-hards....
Very much love.
E.R.M.
[P.S.]
A correspondent in The Tablet this week says Anglicans can’t be considered by Catholics as belonging to the Church—I suppose the Christian Church.224 This seems to me to be going too far, and if I was the editor I wouldn’t print it. I wonder if Canon Mortlock (against whom the letter was addressed) will answer it, or think silence better.225 I don’t suppose the writer is very educated—at least he puts the name of his house in quotation marks, which is usually a sign of this.
Wednesday [20 November, 1957]226
… Yes, I think the Church would be made if a Bishop went up for the dog. I hope the R.C.s won’t get in first. I’d send one of those East Anglian bishops, who are so evangelical—no, I wouldn’t, I’d send a very High one (any except Tewkesbury, who can’t be spared). I wished you had seen with me the TV interview between Muggeridge and Alec Vidler, the Dean of King’s. I went to my Club to see it. It was v.g. I took notes of it. I also wrote to the B.B.C. to say they must have it on sound radio. Dr V. answered M.’s questions, about the creeds, Articles etc. None of them are to be taken literally, all are symbols of truth. (Tell Miss B——this.)…
Much love.
R.
27 November, [1957]
Dearest Jeanie,
I am so very sorry about your flu…. Nancy said it began quite suddenly, which this Asian [kind] always seems to. I know a man who started for his office at 9.0, feeling quite well, walked to the underground, still feeling well, and suddenly collapsed just as his train drew up, fortunately before he got into it. He took a taxi home and went to bed with a temp. 103, which had come on quite suddenly. He stayed in bed 3 days, and then was able to go about again. I have heard of several which began equally suddenly, sometimes with a faint, as Dorothea’s did. I do hope you won’t get up too soon… N. says she is quite safe from catching it, because she isn’t afraid of it! This is what my old char used to say when I begged her not to come near my bed when I had flu and tried to make her smell Vapex. ‘You don’t catch it unless you’re afraid of it’, she said, and no number of times of being proved wrong would shatter this dogma, which uneducated people always seem to have. It is no use telling them that it is often caught quite unconsciously, from sitting near someone in a bus as they won’t believe it. I notice that the Dales227 say this whenever any of them have flu or a cold. But anyhow it is certain that flu isn’t catching after the temp, is down, or has been down for a day, so Friday will certainly be safe. I should be disappointed not to come. When I do, shall I bring you Jowett, and an interesting book (older) about the Oxford movement, by J. Lewis May—very good about all the leading people.228 I have been reading several books lately partly about that, as it was raging in the mid-century at Oxford. Its effect on poor A. H. Clough was disastrous; for a short time he was carried away by ‘Newmania’, but very soon rallied and reacted against it, having a v.g. rational intellectual mind, and having been trained by Dr Arnold, who disliked the whole business. But his earlier faith was shattered by all the discussion and argument, and his work went to pieces owing to lack of attention to it, and he only got a 2nd instead of the 1st every one expected of him. Later he swallowed the Articles, which they then had to do before matriculating, and got an Oriel Fellowship, and lectured there for 6 years, but the Artic
les were very indigestible all the time, and he was very honest, and after 6 years he threw them up, together with his job, and left Oxford, which was very sad. He was a very attractive character; I have just been reviewing two large vols of his letters, and those to him.229They are full of interesting things and people. However, I am selling them, while still clean, as they apparently cost £5:5....
I have been invited by Lady Ravensdale to a gathering about Penhalonga, addressed by Fr Huddleston, to raise money (some huge sum230—why does everything need such astronomic sums? It seems too ambitious; surely a little at a time would be better) and will I bring with me some ‘rich tycoon’. I know none, or none who would finance a missionary house in S. Africa. I don’t move among millionaires. I get hundreds of appeals all the time, for this & that. People seem to start things in faith, and then have to beg in order to go on. We have become a nation of hitch-hikers, thumbing every one for lifts.... I met Mr Gaitskell at dinner, and liked him. It was at the Ian Flemings…
Very much love,
E.R.M.
20, Hinde House, Hinde St, W. 1 3 December, [1957]
Dearest Jeanie,
... I had a very interesting Sunday evening again at my club seeing two programmes, the ‘Brains Trust’, on which… Sir Ifor Evans was nice, and also James Morris, and I always like [A. J.] Ayer. But I enjoyed much more the ‘Christian Meeting Point’ programme, on which the Indian Mr Pande (Methodist) was seen at his leper college [sic], and being interviewed by C. Mayhew, about how he felt towards God.231 He said he had no direct perception of God, not being a mystic, no visions or anything, but felt God all the time in his work, and in his relations with other people, especially the lepers, to whom he is devoted. He was a very nice, smiling man; we saw him also in the leper chapel, taking a service and preaching, and with his wife and young son afterwards. The last part of the programme was an interview between Mr Mayhew and Fr Hugh Bishop, C.R., when they discussed the two Christian ideals shown by the Franciscan last Sunday and Mr Pande this Sunday, one mostly prayer & worship & monastic life, the other service and work. Fr Bishop said the two sides of Christianity depended on each other, and must weave in and out; he thought the work would become dry and stale without prayer, and the prayer rather sterile without the work. He is an excellent interviewee. I quite see why religious people don’t go to evening church as much as they did; TV is so much more interesting and full of ideas. It is rather sad for the clergy, who naturally like a full church and a full collection; perhaps they all ought to hold services and discussions on TV, and have it in church, on a large screen. That would fill the churches all right.
I didn’t see about the worker priest; what does he work at? There is a fashion for this just now, started by the French. I haven’t yet read Canon Moore Darling’s book about his experiences when in the factories talking to the workers.232 The whole business of religion is in a state of great transition just now, and very interesting. If the Church wants people to belong, it’s got to drop the present rigid system of set services.
Did you hear the religious Brains Trust on Sunday?233Rather foolish questions, on the whole, like the one about, in view of the sufferings of people in concentration camps (as if people hadn’t suffered far worse than that in former ages), has the Atonement lost its meaning. People often seem to turn slightly mental when speaking of the Atonement; I wish we had less of it. It is a Hebrew idea carried on into Christianity, based on the sacrifice of animals to the glory of God, and had better be let drop now, surely. But it does seem to mean something to a lot of people. To me, nothing, and it spoils a number of hymns etc. for me. Advent, on the other hand, gets to mean more and more; perhaps because of so soon dying. Fr Harris preached so well on Sunday about Christmas, and not making it an orgy of present-giving to each other but sending the money saved to refugees and others in need. I think he had got some of his ideas from a Xmas article I wrote in The Spectator which had pleased him.234 Is it part of my mission, do you think, to give the clergy good ideas? I wish the R.C. ones were more open to them. Really it seems scarcely credible, their view of the Christian Church. They leave their pamphlets in Grosvenor Chapel sometimes, to convert us, called ‘Reasons for being a Catholic’, and so on. Fr Derry says an Anglican wrote an answer, called ‘But I am a Catholic’,235 but this is like a red rag to a bull to them, and no use at all. When they say ‘Catholic toleration of Anglicans has been carried to its very limits’, as someone in The Tablet did,236 what do you think he meant to do about it? He sounded like Hitler, ‘my patience is exhausted’, and we know what he did about it. We can’t be saved without baptism, they keep saying; it is such a wild notion that one wonders if they are really unbalanced, or if their minds are so feeble that they really can believe that love of God and moral struggle can’t save. I wish I knew one of them I could talk to about such things without upsetting them. I shall listen this evening to the Greek church on divorce.237
I am glad you find J. L. May interesting.238 He is rather too sold on unity, I think, but good on the people in the movement. They must have been exciting times. But what a terrible state of mind the majority were in about ritualism and popery! We have certainly improved.
I saw a film about Tarzan this afternoon, but not v.g.239 I am told The Ten Commandments aren’t v.g. either, in spite of the Red Sea dividing and drowning Pharaoh’s army and chariots, as on the posters. How very religious the Jews were! Melting down all their precious gold ornaments in order to have a golden calf to worship in the desert; it was really rather touching, tho’ stupid….
Very much love.
E.R.M.
I still brood over the Dame business.240
If you invest your £1000 well, you will have a little more to give away annually.
20, Hinde House, Hinde St, W.1 New Year’s Eve, 1957
Dearest Jeanie,
This is to send my love for 1958. I shall be going out soon to a watch night party, tho’ we shall not watch much, but see the new year in with babble & revel & wine. I don’t know why we don’t have a Mass for it.
I am busy with the Articles, reading Newman’s Tract 90 on them, and Pusey on Newman. Newman & Pusey both quite disobey the preliminary order of 1562 about not putting one’s own interpretation on them,241 but sticking to the sense and literal meaning as put down, on pain of punishment. ‘Dr Jenkinson’ (who is Jowett in Mallock’s New Republic242) preaches in a sermon ‘Even if we do come across some incident in the history of our religion which seems, humanly speaking, to subserve no good end at all—such as our own 39 Articles—let us not suffer such to try our faith, but let us trust in God, believing that in his secret councils He has found some fitting use even for these’…. When I have more time, I will look up which I don’t believe, and perhaps can tell you on Friday.
The news of my Dameship has reached the Press, which rings me up for photographs, but I won’t have this. I think the list is sent to the papers two days before Jan. 1st. I am told that, as regards literature, it is a rather dull list, which tends I am afraid to concentrate interest on me, as Dames are considered interesting. Well, I hope it will soon blow over. People ring me up to say how pleased they are, which is nice of them. But I am afraid I shall also have to answer a lot of letters.
I enclose the Times sermon, which I like. It is what I have felt always, after childhood, that the Bethlehem legends, on which Xmas tends to concentrate, are irrelevant to me, and I expect it is true that they cause disbelief in the Incarnation in many people. On the other hand, no doubt many others find their faith strengthened by them….
Very much love, and a good year to you both….
R.
20, Hinde House, Hinde St, W.1 Twelfth Night [5 January] 1958
Dearest J.,
I send the Epiphany sermon in The Times, a v.g. one, I think. Also, as I know you don’t take the Sunday Times, a photograph they published of me typing, or rather pretending to type. I look very industrious! Do you ever hear any of ‘Woman’s Hour’?243 On Wednesday
at 2.0 they begin with New Year Honours guests; they asked me to speak at it, but I am lunching elsewhere at that time, so they asked me to record a few remarks tomorrow afternoon, for transmission on Wednesday. They say they will ask me a few questions, which is easier than speaking without stimulus. If you listen, tell me what it is like. I believe it is repeated (perhaps more fully) next Sunday at 9.10 or so, in the morning, on the Home programme ‘Home for the Day’. I don’t think I can hear that either, as I shall be staying in Dorset and probably shan’t be able to listen. I think they said they would ask me about things I like and don’t like. If so, I shall probably say I like beautiful country and buildings, driving through romantic scenery, swimming in warm seas when no one else is doing so near me, good company and talk, listening to good music, including a well sung and orchestrated Mass. I shan’t include the things every one likes, such as nice food & bed, being loved & flattered, watching people happy etc., reading interesting books. I shall say I dislike crooning, especially vulgar and silly love songs, repairing things that have gone wrong, such as my car, my clothes, etc., religious intolerance (I don’t mind other intolerance nearly so much, as it isn’t paradoxical), industrial towns, ugly and monotonous rows of houses, etc. I shan’t mention the obvious things, such as cruelty & wickedness & oppression & cold. But whether there will be time for all these I don’t know. The more vulgar and silly newspapers, I might add. I don’t know who else will be speaking.
I go on getting cartsfull of kind letters daily. It is nice to get them and read them, tho’ less so to answer them. I have laid in a lot of convenient cards, with flowers on them, but do feel I must write many letters too. I wish more people would type theirs. When they don’t I often revenge myself by hand-written answers, of which they have to make what they can. Such a nice one from E. M. Forster this morning. I bagged 4 bishops (perhaps more, I forget), 2 ambassadors, and of course most of my literary colleagues, and too many wires signed with names I can’t identify, tho’ sometimes the postmark helps. I see how neglectful I have usually been in writing congratulations. Some years after he became a Knight Hugh Walpole told me I hadn’t written to him about it; he was a pettish man.
Letters to a Sister Page 19