14 FEBRUARY 1925, Page 14

[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] Sin,—I have read with

interest (though belatedly) the letters of Mr. Studdert Kennedy and" I.L.P." ; and I think candour must admit that the Industrial Christian Fellowship evangelists are following the method and therefore the mind of Christ. He knew He could change the world only by changing men's hearts. And so His brief years on earth were spent in sowing seeds—the seeds of new ideas, which as they sprang up bore fruit in a gradually changing outlook on such fundamental matters as getting and keeping, behaviour to the weak, &c. He plainly said He did not come to lay down new economic or social laws. He would not even criticize the existing ones. But He knew that the spiritual laws He did lay down would bring the others in their train, in the only way they could be brought—i.e., by changing man's attitude towards His dear self.

Can " I.L.P." claim that those whom he represents have nothing further to learn from Christianity ? Collective selfishness is still selfishness.

Even ethically it is by no means generally accepted that to live on what you have not personally earned is robbery. And for the " Evangelists " to take their stand on such doubtful ground would only militate against the acceptance a truths for which men were not ripe even in the days of