Letters to a Sister (22 page)

… [Dorothea] certainly does plenty of thinking about
T. of T.
I don't know where she finds that Laurie and Vere were getting tired of each other; they weren't, actually.

The Doubt man was good last week.
¹²⁹
Now we have Bp Wand who looks for the Second Coming any minute, which must make life most exciting for him. I expect he hopes for it before his death, which would save him a lot of bother about his will, tidying up etc. I should like this too, but have no hopes for it. It would be so nice all to go out together, as by nuclear bomb only more so. He sounded as if he had no doubts about it. I wonder how many people think this.

I expect Miss B——knows far more than I do about how to take a Greek course, as she has been a teacher. Does she know any Greek yet? I wonder if she has night schools or Polytechnic courses within reach; if not, I suppose she could do it all with books. It seems a very good idea. My Greek is slight, but I should like to improve it if ever I get time. Today we celebrated Clement of Alexandria, with a good lesson on Wisdom, which was his great theme. But of course he's not a classic. It is useful to have the Loeb translations of Homer, Aristotle, Plato, Thucydides, etc., where the Greek is printed down the page parallel with the English, so it is easy to follow.

I enclose the
Times
sermon, good; (stickiness on back is where my pot of gold paint stood on it while I painted my card. I must bring some on Friday to do; I get on very slowly, and shall never do all; many recipients will be Goats, who only get a plain card.)

I may get a cold tonight; tiresome hostess rang up to say they both have bad colds, and did I mind? I said was it flue, because I wouldn't come if so; she said no, only colds; so I
shall inhale Antistin before & after & trust in God, who I hope will play up.

Very much love…. People have gone petrol-mad, and there are long queues at every garage, great bitterness, great bribery.

E.R.M
.

27
December, [1956]

Dearest Jeanie,

I got home yesterday afternoon in good time, fortified by a delicious cup of soup made by Nancy from genuine chicken. I feel like a man I heard saying in a shop this morning ‘Yes, thank you, I had a nice Christmas. Quiet, you know, but plenty to eat. Now I have to spend the week working it off.' I feel like that too, after all your delicious food, especially the Xmas dinner. I've not yet worked that off, tho' I went out this morning to 7.30 Mass at St James's near me, & have since been trying to clear the flat of Xmas litter. R.C. Mass is much less congregational than ours, the people don't even join in the creed, and the priest mutters it; it would be more audible in one of the side chapels, no doubt. But on the whole I feel the Reformation was an improvement, especially now that it has, in this country, righted itself a little and allows of attractive services. Though, if I had to choose between the type of C. of E. in St Paul's, Portman Square, close to me, and an R.C. church, the R.C. would win every time….

I am worried about you, and shall be until I hear that you can stop work. Do let me know when you hear.
¹³⁰
Nancy is much worried too. She doesn't think you are at all well.

One thing I hope you will never worry about
at all
is money. I, as I said, would like, if you will let me, to take over all your
current covenants. (Not of course officially, but I would pay you the money.) Will you consider this, and tell me how much they are. Remember I have oodles of money, and they are all things I would wish to subscribe to (presumably). Please let me know how much it would be, when next I come. It is a serious thing to be deprived of one's salary suddenly, having already made commitments.
¹³¹
If you got into touch with my brokers… they would do a lot in the way of improving your finances, selling one thing to buy a better thing, etc. etc. It is worth while...

Except Alan Pryce-Jones, who spoke up for me, the speakers on novels last night didn't care for mine,
¹³²
they thought it facetious and didn't like religion, sin etc. in novels. Of course some people don't, though so many people do that it was unlucky my getting these. They didn't like ‘High Anglicanism', or jokes about it….

[The end of this letter is missing]

20, Hinde House, Hinde St, W.1 26 January, [1957]

Dearest Jeanie,

... I thought the ‘Lift up your Hearts' this week rather poor. I hoped he was going to deal with the difficulties and attempts at reunion, and hopes for the future, not with six men who only started World Councils etc., or did mission work. He didn't even give Temple's views on intercommunion. Year after year they go on fiddling round the subject, never getting anywhere. This evening I may go to the… church with the spiteful remark about South India on the door, as there is a
good man preaching, though I wouldn't if I were he. It would be wonderful if he broke out about how unchristian such an attitude is. The vicar couldn't stop him of course.

I have been asked by two bishops to write a play about the Church of the Future, for acting at a congress at Cheltenham in October. Of course I shan't. I get asked to do the oddest things now. I wasn't asked to give my views on Immortality in the
Sunday Times
series, and shouldn't anyhow have done it. I enclose Dorothy Sayers, which is rather interesting.
¹³³

It was nice to see Mr Carpenter
¹³⁴
again on Friday evening. He is nearly 80 now, but very little changed. He has retired from being Dean of Exeter, and lives near it and lectures & writes. It was to him that I made my last confession, in 1921 or 2, before giving it up for 30 years. He always had a very nice sense of humour, and tells amusing stories about people.

Rebecca West has sent me her new novel,
¹³⁵
& I have partly read it. It is very well told and interesting. I must write to her now….

Be careful, it is getting colder.

Very much love.

E.R.M.

20, Hinde House, Hinde St, W.1 3 March, 1957

Dearest Jeanie,

I thought you might like to see the Pope's latest medical pronouncement.
¹³⁶
Also, the
Times
Saturday sermon, and the
account of the wave of R.C. conversions. They are really rather striking. I put them down mainly to a desire for novelty and change, as more exciting than the familiar C. of E. and dissent. Will Britain become a popish country? Much more so than at present, I think. But, in about 50 years, that too will be familiar, and there may be a swing back towards C. of E. People do like a change. And it's much more important to most people to have an interesting religion, with plenty of fuss and doings and pageantry, than one they can really and truly believe with their reasons. Will they get some C. of E. churches back, I wonder. Better give them some than let them stand empty. It will be interesting if it becomes really fashionable in all classes. The fresh influx of converts may in the end have a modifying effect on the doctrines taught.

I went to evening service at All Saints' [Margaret Street] today, & came in for an adult baptism, but was too far away to see how it was done. They had the whole baptism service, and the candidate said she renounced them all, and all this she faithfully believed. After it the vicar preached about it, and how it was a new life; it seems she had for some time worshipped there, but hadn't been a Church member. Next Sunday she will be confirmed, so then she will be all set for the Christian life. The vicar said that however often she might sin in future, she can seek forgiveness and be restored. I gathered he thinks it little use to seek forgiveness if not baptised. I wonder if she found it embarrassing to be preached about, but perhaps she liked it, and it was her finest hour. It's a pity most of us have it too young to feel pleased or new; I think baptism should really be at 8 or 9, when they can understand it; it might be a great romance and fresh start, and they would be too young to be sceptical, as one sometimes is at confirmation. Mother would have made us very enthusiastic about it.

What a marvellous spring day, the March sun feels like May. I hope you have enjoyed it by bicycling about a little.
I ran my new car about round the parks, and took two nice young Germans from the Embassy a little way.
¹³⁷
They had come to St Paul's, [Knightsbridge] as they have discovered Anglicanism and are enthusiastic about it. I introduced them to the vicar
¹³⁸
after Mass. One of them said ‘What a charming man: he reminds me of a witty Jesuit priest I know in the Rhineland.' In the Rhineland he said they dance all Shrove Tuesday, after being shriven. We told the vicar he should introduce Ash Wednesday ashes at Mass; he wasn't sure if the curate would like it, or if all the congregation would.
¹³⁹
I am sending you
Time and Tide,
with my Lent article in it,
¹⁴⁰
as it may be helpful….

I must sit up a little later in Lent, to get my Hour
¹⁴¹
done as well as everything else. Is this the fast that I have chosen? Perhaps it ought to be going to Mass at 7.30 instead of 8.15 or 8.30; but I draw the line at that. Did you hear a talk about being 70?
¹⁴²
People seem to feel they are very old at 70. I don't, at all, tho' I know I am.

Very much love.

E.R.M.

19 March, [1957]

Dearest Jeanie,

... I send your sermon ration for the week, including one of the Survival series by an Indian.
¹⁴³
I am using up some of
my daily Hour by copying out Fr Waggett's Holy Week addresses, that I began last year….

I wonder why poor Tilsley cut his throat
¹⁴⁴
; I suppose a mental breakdown. I can't believe that any one in his sensefs] would choose that way, it would be so difficult and painful, and there are so many easy ways….

Did you hear a discussion on the 3rd programme about imprisonment the other day? I was invited to hear it, at the Aquinas Centre
¹⁴⁵
; I never think those Disputations are v.g. It seemed to shirk the point of punishment, they talked about ‘restoring the moral law', when surely the point is deterrence and prevention….

Very much love.

E.R.M.

When you feel quite recovered, can you come up one day to tea, to meet Susan Lister, who wants to meet you? She is a very charming person; she lectures on theology at King's College (London) and does a lot of speaking to women's meetings, etc.

20, Hinde House, Hinde St, W.1 24 March, [1957]

Dearest Jeanie,

Here is the fridge cheque; I'm
so
glad you are having one at last. It is necessary for the healthy life. I suppose it is guaranteed for a year, so that if it goes wrong it will be put right free. I find mine an [in]estimable benefit….

This morning, as we came out of St Paul's [Knightsbridge]
after High Mass, there was a row of men with sandwich boards picketing us, saying ‘The Mass is a Blasphemous Fable…' ‘The C. of E. has no Priests', etc. etc. Perhaps to show that, though J. A. Kensit died the other day, his soul goes marching on.
¹⁴⁶
I see we are far from union yet. Nothing would bring those men into St Paul's, except to make a row….

Very much love.

E.R.M.

31 March, [1957]

Dearest Jeanie,

Here are your sermons. When do [you] see Dr S——
¹⁴⁷
again? I do hope he will give you something better for your blood pressure. It is one of my chief worries in my small-hours anguish, and I always hope to hear it has gone down.

Another lovely day. Too good to sit answering letters all the afternoon, but they lap about me like a great rising tide, looking awful as they toss about like white breakers, and [I] expect to drown in the end.

Now I have to go out, so n.g. writing any more. It
was
nice seeing you yesterday. Do take care of yourself.

V. much love.

R.

11 April, [1957]

Dearest Jeanie,

... I will go to Venice if you can get Dr S——when you see him next to tell you exactly how he thinks you are,
blood pressure, arteries, and all.
Or
if you will give me leave to write and ask him, telling him that I have your leave, and that I much want to know before I go to Italy. I shan't, of course, write to him behind your back, as he probably wouldn't tell me—or anyhow he ought not to. If I can't get a satisfactory report, I shan't go. I shouldn't enjoy myself. When you do see him again?…

I am sending this week's
Listener
with another of Ronald Gregor Smith's talks
¹⁴⁸
; not so good as the last one, I thought. Will there be an end of all such talks, when the 3rd Programme is shortened, the Home adapted to the Light, the Light vulgarised even further than now, ‘with more emphasis on light music, and less on the spoken word'?
¹⁴⁹
And a new programme, the Network [Three], which will be about pigeons, mostly (why?).
¹⁵⁰
The whole object is to compete with the popularity of Television, as well as economy. It is a sad surrender to Vulgar Taste, and time we went. Another example of surrender to V.T. was in that very vulgar… article by a Canadian woman in the
News Chronicle
about ‘the English woman',
¹⁵¹
how she has no mind, no conversation, is short & broad, can't dress or do her hair, can't walk, but hobbles along holding on to someone else, and smells. How
can
the N.C. publish such low, silly… stuff?

V. much love.

E.R.M.

Maundy Thursday [18 April, 1957]

Dearest Jeanie,

... I am having very crowded days this week. I went out of London yesterday to Gerard Irvine's parish,
¹⁵²
to see a performance of
Everyman,
done by his parishioners in modern dress. I drove John Betjeman down, and the young German
¹⁵³
from the Embassy who is so interested in High Anglicanism; he was delighted with J.B., who could tell him a lot of things. He himself is a high Lutheran; he says the Lutherans are getting higher, and have now widely adopted confession. But he says they aren't yet so high as our high churches. I thought the
News Chronicle
survey very prejudiced against the C. of E.
¹⁵⁴
John Betjeman says it is nonsense that they don't make a lot of converts, and that they make more than Rome does. But of course Rome makes many. Patrick McLaughlin (Rev. Fr) says there is ‘a wave of Tertullianism' in the Universities—i.e.
‘credo quia impossible,
' and of course that takes them to Rome; quite a good thing for them, I think, though madly irrational. The
N.C.
says we are snobbish. Do you think we are?…