can deny that Father Bernard Vaughn is in mental energy, vigour of expression, richness of thought and variety of information fully the equal of such an influential lay publicist as Mr. Horatio Bottomley.  One might search for a long time among prominent laymen to find the equal of the Bishop of London.  Nevertheless it is impossible to conceal the impression of tawdriness that this latter gentleman’s work as head of the National Mission has left upon my mind.  Attired in khaki he has recently been preaching in the open air to the people of London upon Tower Hill, Piccadilly, and other conspicuous places.  Obsessed as I am by the humanities, and impressed as I have always been by the inferiority of material to moral facts, I would willingly have exchanged the sight of two burning Zeppelins for this spectacle of ecclesiastical fervour.  But as it is, I am obliged to trust to newspaper reports and the descriptions of hearers and eye-witnesses.  They leave to me but little doubt of the regrettable superficiality of the bishop’s utterances.

We have a multitude of people chastened by losses, ennobled by a common effort, needing support in that effort, perplexed by the reality of evil and cruelty, questioning and seeking after God.  What does the National Mission offer?  On Tower Hill the bishop seems to have been chiefly busy with a wrangling demonstration that ten thousand a year is none too big a salary for a man subject to such demands and expenses as his see involves.  So far from making anything out of his see he was, he declared, two thousand a year to the bad.  Some day, when the church has studied efficiency, I suppose that bishops will have the leisure to learn something about the general state of opinion and education in their dioceses.  The Bishop of London was evidently unaware of the almost automatic response of the sharp socialists among his hearers.  Their first enquiry would be to learn how he came by that mysterious extra two thousand a year with which he supplemented his stipend.  How did he earn that? And if he didn’t earn it—–!  And secondly, they would probably have pointed out to him that his standard of housing, clothing, diet and entertaining was probably a little higher than theirs.  It is really no proof of virtuous purity that a man’s expenditure exceeds his income.  And finally some other of his hearers were left unsatisfied by his silence with regard to the current proposal to pool all clerical stipends for the common purposes of the church.  It is a reasonable proposal, and if bishops must dispute about stipends instead of preaching the kingdom of God, then they are bound to face it.  The sooner they do so, the more graceful will the act be.  From these personal apologetics the bishop took up the question of the exemption, at the request of the bishops, of the clergy from military service.  It is one of our contrasts with French conditions—­and it is all to the disadvantage of the British churches.