Item 186 - Letter from Julius Charles Hare

Notting Hill, London - WW 'must have felt some sympathy with us during the late distressing proceedings at King's College. Now in regard to what is personal in them, Maurice's [Frederick D. Maurice] friends may do what they like to show their affection for him; but it wd of course be unbecoming in me to take any part in such a demonstration: indeed I have felt convinced all along that to him this trial wd be only a purificatory process to fit him for the higher work appointed for him. But so far as the decision affects the church, I see no impropriety in my coming forward, along with others, to do what we can toward averting the evils which seem to me likely to ensue from it. For if the decision is acquiesced in without any protest or remonstrance, - if it is to be held that the belief in the everlasting duration of the torments of hell is an essential article of the faith of our Church, - I cannot but anticipate that the great mass of the thought and intellect of England, which of late years has been drawing nearer to the Church, and among divers classes, in no small measure, through the influences of M's [Maurice's] teaching, will be more and more alienated from her, and that many of the best men who were precarious to doubt themselves to her ministry, will seek refuge out of her pale, in Romanism or some form of pantheistic speculation. In the hope of doing something to counteract this, I have been taking counsel with Trench [Richard C. Trench] and some others; and have thought that a Protest, somewhat like the accompanying Draft, might be of great use, if, as we hope, it cd get a large body of signatures, weighty both from the character and from the number of signers'. What does WW think of such a measure and would he join it?