Perhaps religion presents itself to the Bishop, as
it does to a great number of other people, as a consecration of moral
law, and clearly moral law is something to be established by reason, not
commended by appeals to the sentiments; not for one moment, all the
same, would he countenance the famous cynicism of Gibbon--"The various
modes of worship, which prevailed in the Roman world, were all
considered by the people as equally true; by the philosophers as equally
false; and by the magistrate as equally useful"--for no man sees more
clearly the permanent need of religion in the human spirit, and no man
is more sincerely convinced of the truth of the Christian religion. But
he brings to religion, as I think, only his intellect, and so he has
intellectualised its ethic, and has left its deepest meaning to those
who possess, what he has either always lacked or has forfeited in his
intellectual discipleship, the qualities of mysticism.
One might almost say that he has intellectualised the Sermon on the
Mount, dissected the Prodigal Son as a study in psychology, and taken
the heart out of the Fourth Gospel.
His usefulness, however, is of a high order. With the sole exception of
Dean Inge, no front bench Churchman has displayed a more admirable
courage in confronting democracy and challenging its Materialistic
politics. Moreover, although he modestly doubts his effectiveness as a
public speaker, he has shown an acute judgment in these attacks which
has not been lost upon the steadier minds in the Labour world of the
north.
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