17 JULY 1936, Page 21

THE OXFORD GROUP'S MEETING

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.] Sta,—The account of the Oxford Group's Albert Hall meeting; as given by you in your issue of July 10th, is not without interest.

Our good Sejanus must surely have projected his own lugubrious mood upon the meeting, if he felt " The entire absence of jollity and spontaneity Which is the prime mark of the movement," if he observed " no touch of enthusiasm."

The management and organisation of the meeting was of course English, and not, either in its conception or execution, American, as Sejanus states. (It is rather shocking, though, to find in a journal with the reputation of The Spectator a statement born of such sickening national snobbery and prejudice.) " There was no leading address," he goes on, " from any man of position or authority." The Lord Mayor of Newcastle, . Professor Arthur Norval, Brigadier-General Winser, Baroness von Hahn—these were presumably the " young men and women who one after another repeated Buchman phrases ' " (whatever they are).

It is perhaps too much to expect that Sejanus will at once see eye to eye with a programme of God-control that needs clear thinking and a statesmanlike outlook, but it is surely not too much to expect him to report a meeting with at least some measure of accuracy.—Yours faithfully,